Naruto's Pokemon Journey
by 2shadowwriter2
Summary: Naruto is a new trainer, after being stuck with a stubborn golden Vulpix he heads out to obtain the Eight badges for the Elena Region. Will he be able to defeat his father and become the new champion? And who or what is Team Sound? Rated T for some language and Pokemon fights. A Pokemon and Naruto fusion. Main/eventual NaruXSaku, one sided SakuXSasu and one sided Naru/Ino.
1. Chapter 1 Journey of a Thousand Miles

**Naruto's**

**Pokémon Journey**

***Disclamor: The following is a non-profit fan based story.  
****Naruto is the property of Masashi Kishismoto and TV tokyo.  
****Pokemon is the property of Nitendo, Creatures inc. , and GAME FREAK inc.  
****Please support the official realeases.**

***********You can now follow me on Twitter, go to my profile for details.**

**Chapter 1**

**Journey of a Thousand Miles...**

In a vast and strange world there are creatures known as Pokémon. Pokémon, creatures used anywhere from battling to show ones strength, showing off the beauty of these creatures, or just as friends and playmates. For young trainers who are just starting out receive a starter Pokémon. A starter is a Pokémon who has already been tamed and is at low and acceptable level for fresh trainers. The age for a trainer to receive their first Pokémon and trainers license is thirteen, the age used to be ten, but in the Elena region they have the age standard set higher than the Kanto or Hoen regions. The age for Unova is sixteen so as you can see it's not that bad. Anyway back to the topic at hand.

Naruto Namikaze just turned thirteen and he is more than looking forward to starting his journey. "I'm going to be the best trainer their ever was." He declared aloud in his room. '_Just you wait dad, as soon as I'm ready I'm going to defeat you._' Naruto than began to picture the fight he would have with his father, the Elena Region champion, Minato Namikaze.

_Naruto and his father are at a stadium in front of millions of faceless people, "All right old man, today is the day I take over as the new champion." He then held up a red on top white on bottom spherical device, a poke-ball if you will. He held it in his hand with his arm out stretched pointing at his father in a challenging pose. "All right, GO Groudon!" He shouted and threw the round device in the air, with a 'pop' the ball open to let out a large amount of bluish white light. Soon the light took form in the shape of a gigantic red and black bi-pedal dinosaur like creature. "Let's go Groudon, show them who the new champion is." With a roar from the creature known as Groudon, the battle was over, in Naruto's mind._

_His father was now crying, "You have bested me my son," he started with a choke. "You are truly a champion."_

_It was at these words that the crowd began to chant his name._

**_Naruto_**

**_Naruto_**

**_Naruto_**

**NARUTO!**

Naruto was ripped from his thoughts at the very familiar scream of his name. He turned to see a slightly ticked off long red haired woman, with the same facial features as him, grayish blue eyes, narrowed eyebrows, and a scowl in place. Her figure is very slim for a woman her age. Her arms were folded, ruffling the dark green apron she wore over her light green pajama shirt and pants. The apron had many food smudges, indicating that she was cooking before she took notice of her son shouting his own name.

Naruto scratched the back of his blond spikey head, with a huge grin on his whisker marked face. "Sorry mom," he chuckled, "I guess I got a little carried away."

"Why are you in your clothes I laid out for tomorrow?" She demanded her features unchanged by the grin, except for the tapping of her foot.

"Well," Naruto started, "I'm just so excited about tomorrow I just can't sleep."

Kushina's features softened, he was just anxious about his journey how could she argue with that? Still she put her poker face on and proceeded with her scolding. "And why couldn't you just wear your pajamas instead of the clothes you're going to be travelling in?"

Naruto didn't have an answer for that, so instead he just hung his head and put his arms around his back. After muttering a 'Sorry' he started to get dressed for bed. As he grabbed his bright orange pajama pants and night shirt, Kushina left his room for him to get dressed.

As Naruto lay in bed he couldn't help but think about his imaginary fight with his father, sure he knows he won't win with just one Pokémon, especially with a legendary such as Groudon, but still he could dream. '_Just you wait dad, I'm going to get an awesome team of strong Pokémon, and when I do, I'm going to finally prove that I'm not just as strong as you,_' he looked over at the picture of him and his dad when he was nine years old, '_but that I'm stronger._' With that he shut his eyes, and began to dream of his fight with his father.

_The next day..._

People would say that in the Elena region, the morning sun is a gorgeous sight to see. The one person who wouldn't know this, however, is currently sleeping through the morning sun. As well as the mid-morning sun. With a loud yawn that would rival that of a Snorlax. Naruto Namikaze woke up; still a little sleep sand in his eyes, his spiky blond hair was even spikier and messier. He looked around his room, average size with a bed, a desk with a computer, side table with an old alarm clock. This alarm clock had been his since he was six; it still had those old flip numbers to indicate what time it is. With age, however, the numbers tend to get stuck at certain times. This was the case when Naruto looked over at his device. It was set to go off at seven 'o clock, but the numbers read 6:39 A.M. He knew something was up, what with the morning sun being brighter than it should have been. To check his suspicions he did what he normally would do when the clock was stuck, he pounded it, and suddenly the numbers began to spin rapidly. The device finally stopped on the correct time, 10:29 A.M.

"**CRAP"**

He immediately sprinted out of bed, rushed around his room grabbing his socks and shoes. He didn't even register that he was still in his bright orange pajamas. He ran off toward Professor Sarutobi's lab, leaving a huge dust cloud behind him. He wasn't late; he was SUPER late, if he didn't get to the Pokémon lab now. No he didn't want to think about it, he just kept on running. He could see the lab off in the distance. It was very noticeable, with a huge red dome like top, a tall observation tower right next to it, and a white bottom. Instead of being square, like most buildings, the bottom was circular, and was roughly the size as half a football field. With the roof and white building itself, the whole looks a kin to a gigantic poke-ball. The lab was getting closer and closer now. It was only a matter of time, he just might make it. "Almost there, almo-

**THUD**

Naruto was cut short of his chant, by the sudden appearance of another person. He couldn't stop in time, so only manage to lessen the power of the collision. The two were sent to the ground with a loud bump, and a shout from both. "I'm sorry about tha- He cut himself off when he saw who it was. Actually I'm not sorry." He said folding his arms and turning his head away from the person.

The one he ran into was someone he knew and hated. Sasuke Uchiha, Naruto would recognize that black hair, style to look like a ducks back side, the cold onyx black eyes and that aura of superiority. He took notice of his traveling clothes. Black long sleeve shirt, white shorts and red and black shoes. "Whatever, _loser._" He made sure Naruto heard the 'loser,' in which he did. Naruto began to fume at that, as soon as he got up, he was walking over towards the black hair boy. An icy coldness in his blue eyes.

"Let's not fight, okay?" The nervous statement came from a green eyed, pink haired girl. Wearing a red sleeveless vest like shirt over a light pink one, a light pink mini-skirt over black bicycle shorts, that stopped four inches above her knees. Black almost knee high socks, and pink and black shoes. The scarf she wore was a hot pink color to sort of compliment her long pink hair that reached to the small of her back, Sakura Haruno. She was also laughing nervously, as well as holding her hands up trying to get them to stop before it was to get physical.

Naruto had immediately stopped after Sakura nervously uttered the statement. His tense body soon relaxed as he let his arms fall to his side. "You're right, sorry Sakura-Chan."

Sasuke smirked and chuckled, "Once a loser, always a loser," he looked at Naruto with amusement in his eyes, "so, idiot, you late for a slumber party?"

This caused Naruto to immediately get angry, "Shut up, asshole, once I get my Pokémon I'll kick your ass!" Naruto shouted the last part at his rival, he tends to cuss when he gets angry or riled up. Sasuke merely smirked as he walked by Naruto.

"Sorry, about that Naruto-Sempai, I gotta go I'll see you around." With that apology Sakura ran off to catch up with Sasuke. Naruto couldn't help but smile, he liked it when she called him sempai, but at the same time he doesn't. It's mostly because of whom his dad is that she and everyone else uses the formality. Most people call him that or Sama, he didn't like either really, because it wasn't earned. He's not some egotistical asshole, in his words, like Sasuke, who doesn't believe in earning a title. He couldn't think on that anymore. He had to get to Professor Sarutobi, so he can get his new Pokémon.

After entering the door he ran into one of the professor's aides, literally, Iruka Umino. Naruto tried to stop himself, but still manage to hit the person. "Sorry about that Iruka-san."

Iruka only smiled at the boy, while dusting off and straightening his lab coat. "It's alright, Naruto." Iruka waved it off, "so, what's the hurry?"

"Well," Naruto began to scratch the back of his head, a trait he got from his mother. "I wanted to get a starter from Professor Sarutobi."

Iruka nodded, with a thoughtful look on his face, he cupped his chin. "Well, you better hurry then."

Naruto's lateness once again dawned on him, with a rushed good-bye sent towards the assistant, Naruto ran to where the professor would be.

"Be careful, Naruto!" Iruka called after him.

Naruto waved as he kept on running and going around a corner.

Naruto was almost too where he was supposed to pick up a starter Pokémon. He could tell thanks to all the times he and his mom visited the ex-champion. The professor certainly was like a grandfather to Naruto. Unfortunately as he was reflecting on the past he didn't notice the purple clad girl he was about to run into.

**THUD**

"Ow, watch where you're going, idiot!" Shrieked a voice, "Oh, hi Naruto-kun."

Naruto recognized that voice though, when he got back to his feet. It was one Ino Yamanaka, wearing a purple zipper vest, over a black short sleeve shirt, also wearing a tight purple skirt over black shorts. Black socks and black and purple shoes were worn upon her feet. Her platinum blonde hair was in a long pony tail, while wearing a purple bandanna with a poke-ball design. She was blushing furiously under Naruto's gaze. Naruto always noticed how Ino is quick to show herself off by wearing tight clothes. He always thought tight clothes would be too restricting in a Pokémon battle.

He then looked away from the down blonde girl and took notice of his two longtime friends. One was Shikamaru Nara, wearing a gray hoodie and tan shorts, with white socks and gray sneakers. His hair was in a spikey pony tail, making his hair look like a pineapple. The other boy was Choji Akamichi; he was a portly boy who could always be seen eating. He wore a red button up shirt unbutton, over a white shirt with a Snorlax sleeping picture. Brown shorts and red and brown shoes. Unlike Shikamaru, he had a red clothed head band, like you would wear for tennis, with a Snorlax head on the front. The band kind of blended in with his red-orange hair.

"Hey Shika, hey Cho," Naruto greeted walking pass Ino to talk to his two best friends.

"Hey, who's going to help me up?" The blond girl asked annoyed.

The trio of boys simply ignored her. "Hey Naruto," Shikamaru said smiling to his friend; he then noticed the boys attire. "What's with the pajamas?"

Naruto looked down; a shock look appeared on his face. "Uh, I kinda overslept." He began to scratch his head and laugh sheepishly.

"Figures," Shikamaru sighed. Naruto simply hung his head in shame, muttering about stupid old alarm clocks. "So," he got Naruto's attention, "you going to get a starter?"

"Yeah," Naruto answered quickly, out of his depressing mood.

"Better hurry, I don't know if Professor Sarutobi has anymore." Choji finally spoke up.

"What?" Naruto asked a little too loudly.

"Geez watch the volume will ya, you're almost as loud as Ino." This got a 'Hey' from the blonde girl. "Yeah I think we might have gotten the last ones." Shikamaru continued ignoring the glare from Ino.

"Better hurry Naruto-kun, he might have one more." Ino said at an actual normal volume trying to lighten the boy's spirits. The 'kun' is because she did have crush and desire for the spikey haired blond. Mostly because of whom his father is. That's right Ino is superficial.

"See ya around guys." Naruto yelled after running past them.

"Bye Naruto-kun." Ino shouted to her crush.

Choji and Shikamaru merely waved to the boy, silently laughing at Ino's fan-girliness.

"Shut it!" She yelled to the two.

Naruto finally got to his destination, once there he was breathing hard and trying to catch his breath. He was also trying to request a Pokémon. "Starter *huff* poke*huff*mon, *huff**puff*please." After getting that out he fell to the ground, repeating the request over and over.

Professor Sarutobi smiled amusingly at the boy. The professor's attire was how it always was, a white button up shirt tucked into brown khakis, wearing brown loafers, and of course the signature lab coat. A curved smoking pipe in his mouth, he took hold of the pipe. "So you want a starter, eh?"

Naruto nodded still trying to catch his breath, but was shocked by the professor's next statement.

"I'm sorry but your too late, all my starters were taken." He put the pipe in his mouth and began to puff.

"What?" Naruto shouted upset with the results the man gave him. "Are you sure you don't have _any_ starters?"

The professor took upon a thoughtful look, "Hmm." He then spoke with some good news. "I do have one Pokémon, he's stronger than a starter should be and not quite tamed yet."

"I'll take him!" Naruto shouted.

"Are you sure, he is quite the handful, even for me."

Naruto nodded his head a huge grin almost breaking his face, "I can handle anything." He said enthusiastically.

"Okay." He is not yet sure how the boy will handle the Pokémon he has in mind.

After he put his pipe down, the professor then went over to a machine that looked as though it recently had poke-balls in it. He pressed a blue button on the side of the machine and then with sparks and a white flash a poke-ball was in one of the slots. On the red half of the ball was a red and orange flame design. "Here you go Naruto, good luck." He handed Naruto the poke-ball and took a couple steps back.

The boy was confused at first, but soon shook it off. He looked at the poke-ball getting a good feeling about the Pokémon inside. "Come on out!" He shouted throwing the ball in the air. With a pop and a release of blue light, an oddly colored Vulpix appeared. He was a golden color while his tails, paws, and the tuff of hair on his head being more of a yellow orange. Naruto blinked and then kneeled down to the Vulpix's level. "What's wrong with him?" This seemed to be the wrong thing to ask, on the count that as soon as the words left his mouth. The **Ember** attack left the Vulpix's, successfully burning Naruto's face. "Gah!" Naruto fell over while clearing the soot off his face.

"It's a Shiny Pokémon, a very rare one in fact." The old professor stated.

The Vulpix seemed to laugh as it curled up and began to sleep. "Alright you, back in your ball." After Naruto recalled the Vulpix, it suddenly popped back out of the poke-ball.

"Interesting." The professor hummed. "It seems Vulpix likes to be outside of his ball."

"Guess so." Naruto answered staring at the fake sleeping Pokémon.

"So, what will you name him?" The professor looked towards Naruto.

"Uh, well I was planning on naming my starter Kurama." He said scratching his whiskered marked cheek. "So, I guess I'll call him Kurama."

The professor nodded as he went to his desk. He grabbed something and began to fiddle with it, once done he grabbed something else and then walked back over to Naruto and the Vulpix now known as Kurama. "Here you go." He said handing the objects to the blonde boy.

The first object was an orange rectangular device with a black poke-ball design near the bottom, and a white button in the middle of the ball. The screen was green and when activated a second screen slid from the back to the top the same color as the bottom. He noticed a picture of himself with a determined look along with basic info. Such as how many Pokémon obtained and seen both reading one. Info on said Pokémon like type, name, and nickname along with original trainer. As well as identifying how many badges the owner has obtained. The second object or rather, objects, was six regular poke-balls.

"The first thing you have is a poke-dex, or Dexter," The professor began to explain. "This is the newest model, it has several features, such as Trainer I.D. scanner, which will scan a trainer and give you the basics on said trainer's stats." Naruto ahh-ed at this, "the other objects are the standard poke-balls, be sure to use them well."

Naruto nodded, "Thanks Prof." He said using his nickname for the old trainer. "Come on Kurama let's go." Naruto started to walk off but then noticed that the Shiny Vulpix hasn't moved at all. "Come on Kurama let's go." Naruto picked up the Pokémon and began to carry him. Even though Kurama struggled, it couldn't get away so it just decided to go limp, which made it harder for Naruto to carry him. He then began to leave the lab.

Naruto was on his way home when he met up with his mother. "Mom?" Naruto was shocked to run into his mother. "What are you doing here?"

"Well," she started, "you left in such a rush you forgot to change into your traveling clothes."

The boy hung his head in shame, which caused Kurama to laugh at his humiliation. "Oh, who's this cutie?" Kushina gushed.

"Oh yeah," Naruto almost forgot to introduce his mom to Kurama. "Mom, this is Kurama," he held up the fox Pokémon. "Kurama this is my mom." Kurama leapt out of Naruto's looser grip and began to sniff the woman. "Watch out!" Naruto exclaimed when he saw his mom reaching out to pet the shiny Pokémon. Ignoring his warning she kept reaching to pet Kurama. When she did Naruto was shocked when the Vulpix didn't spit fire at her. Instead he purred and snuggled into the touch. "I guess he's okay then." Naruto said more to himself than his mom. However, when he went to pet Kurama, the little beast spat fire at the whiskered face of Naruto.

"He seems like such a sweetie." His mother cooed. Naruto mumbled a 'to you' as he got up from the ground. "Well, honey, I brought your clothes and I packed your bag to last 'til you get to Boulder City." She held up the items. "I also packed a survival guide, a map, a first aid kit just in case, a couple cook books, your sleeping bag, and I made sure to pack lots of Pokémon food."

"Thanks mom." He took the items from the woman, after making her turn, and made sure the coast was clear, he began to change. "'Kay you can turn around now." When Kushina turned she gasped, she swore he looked like a younger version of her husband. Naruto's attire consisted of a blue sleeveless turtleneck, with a dark orange button up shirt. A white zipper hoodie unzipped, with two blue stripes going down the sleeves, dark blue jeans and finally black and white sneakers.

"You look just like your father." She commented, which caused Naruto to look embarrassed.

"Thanks mom." He said scratching his head with a slight blush on his face.

"Oh, I almost forgot." She stated pulling an object out of her purse. She bent down towards Kurama again and began to put something around his neck. Naruto could see a black collar with a soothe bell and a name tag with the word 'Kurama' etched in white on the blue tag. She stood back up with a smile on her features. "There. Now you and your starter are ready to go."

"Thanks mom." Naruto said smiling towards his mother. Meanwhile Kurama is scratching at the new object around his neck. Slightly ticked and slightly calm at the sound the bell made.

Naruto then picks Kurama up, who isn't too happy about it, and begins to head out of Leaf Town. "Bye mom, see you on my birthday!" He shouts out as he heads for Dark Forest.

_Dark Forest_

Dark Forest is an extremely dense forest, one would get lost if they didn't know the way through, but luckily Naruto knows this forest like he knows his name. He's been through it many times when he would travel with his mom to visit his father. So he knew all the shortcuts and all the best places to camp. This is where he is headed so he can do some training with Kurama so they can be ready for the Boulder City battle. He just hopes that the Pokémon would listen to him at least for some training. How does Naruto know how to train Pokémon? Well his dad is the Pokémon champion and his mom is an ex trainer and coordinator as well. So he was bound to pick up a few things from them.

After finding a decent size clearing he set Kurama down, who seemed tired as he just curled up and went to sleep. He began to set up camp, laying out his sleeping bag and getting a fire started. Because another reason why it's called Dark Forest is that if it wasn't for the little sunlight you would think it was night time. So the fire is for a little more light and to keep warm on the account that it also gets cold in the Dark Forest.

Once the fire was set and everything was ready to go, Naruto decided to get some training done with Kurama. "Alright, Kurama, let's get some training done before lunch." The shinnies response was to yawn and readjust his laying position. Naruto's shoulders slumped and a pout found a way on his face. _'This is going to be troublesome.' _He didn't even berate himself for sounding like Shikamaru. He sat down and began to get lunch for himself and his Pokémon.

After lunch, he tried to get the Pokémon's interest in training peeked, but it still did not want to train. _'What do I do about a stubborn Pokémon?' _He could find no answer to the question, mostly because he has never heard of a Pokémon this stubborn before. He tried to poke the sleeping Pokémon, but all it did was spit fire at his face and went back to sleep.

Sure Naruto was upset, but he thought that if he could catch a Pokémon, maybe that would help entice Kurama's interest in training. With the plan set Naruto ventured out while carrying Kurama in his arms. Ignoring the protesting Pokémon, he kept an eye out for any possible teammates for Kurama. His eyes finally caught site of a Pidgey. He took out his poke-dex and scanned it, just to update it a bit; he already knew what a Pidgey was.

He set Kurama down and pointed at the other Pokémon, "Go! Kurama use **Ember.**" It was more like Kurama used rest, on the account of that's what he was doing. "Come on Kurama get your lazy butt in gear." The Pokémon merely fake snored loudly to hint that he wasn't listening. "Garr, fine I'll do it myself." After those words he threw a small rock at the Pokémon, but all it did was to cause the Pidgey to fly away. "Darn it!"

He turned to head back to camp, but when he did he saw a Spearow looking around. _'Cool a Spearow that might come in handy.' _Instead of a rock, this time he threw one of his poke-balls. Once the ball hit the Pokémon, it changed into a red light and was sucked into the spherical device. The ball began to twitch and twitch until...the Spearow busted out of the ball and flew away. "Darn, it was close too."

He was about to head back to camp, but he suddenly heard screeching when he turned, his eyes widened. He sees several Spearow flying towards his location with the one he tried to catch out in front. He screams and begins to run to look for shelter away from the furious Spearow. While running he runs past Kurama. "Kurama-run-its-a-flock-of-angry-Spearow!" He shouted a warning but it was to jumble up for anyone to hear.

Kurama heard the screeching sounds and looks to see several Spearow coming towards him. He begins to fire an **Ember **attack after **Ember **attack. He managed to take out a few but more seemed to take its place. He heard a louder deeper screech and turned to see a Fearow with a few more Spearow's coming to his location. He scowls and continues his volley of **Ember **attacks.

Naruto, hearing the sounds of battle, turns to see multiple **Ember** attacks coming from where Kurama was. He was on his way back to help his partner when he heard the deep loud screech of a Fearow. He saw the Fearow heading to where the battle was and knew that Kurama was in way over his head. He ran to Kurama as fast as he could so he wouldn't be alone. Unfortunately when he got there, that was also the same time the Fearow got there. "Kurama use **Roar.**" The Pokémon ignored him and continued to launch his preferred attack. "Stop being stubborn, and listen to me I'm trying to save you."

Kurama gave him a disbelieving look, as well as taking his eyes off his opponents, so he didn't see the **Razor wind **heading right for him. "Look out!" Kurama turned to see the attack, but he couldn't act in time so he shut his eyes to bare the pain. When Kurama opened his eyes after feeling no pain, they immediately widened in shock. Naruto had taking the force of the attack for Kurama, he looked as though he was in pain but he said nothing except, "Hn, I guess I am a bad trainer, you okay Kurama?" He waited for no reply for he fainted from the shock of the attack.

"_W-Whiskers!" _Kurama called in shock, but only other Pokémon could really hear what the yip of its name really meant. _'He saved me.' _Time seemed to freeze as Kurama was in thought. _'I did nothing but cause him trouble and he saved me.' _He began to think of the short time he had with the only person to really give him any time and patience. Now he was alone again, he let the only one to show any kindness any signs that he actually cared about him... He couldn't even finish the thought. _"I'm sorry I let you down Whiskers." _He began to shed tears as the flock of Spearow's and one Fearow closes in on him

"_Aww, how touching the week little kit misses his stupid human." _The Fearow Cawed.

"_He was not stupid!" _Kurama shouted as he leapt to defend his trainer, he let out a **Roar **attack. The result was the flock all flying away scared of the loud attack.

Once they were gone Kurama went over to Naruto's face and began to mourn softly at the loss of his only friend. He wasn't always such a nuisance, but a few times before Naruto came along, he was always abandoned. Left behind because other trainers thought he was too weird cause of his color, or not able to find anyone to show kindness to him. The first one to come along to do so, he spits fire in his face, ignores his advice on how to get stronger, ignores his commands, and what does it get him? The only one to show him kindness to show that he cares is gone.

He suddenly hears a groan coming from beside him, when he opens his teary eyes, he sees Naruto getting up. His reaction was to pounce on him and began to lick his face.

Naruto, who had just gotten up from his black out, was shocked to see and feel Kurama's soft yet sandy tongue licking his face. He didn't know what to do; he thought he was dead or asleep. "I'm fine Kurama I'm fine." He said getting the Pokémon to get off him, and then he sees tears in the rare Vulpix's eyes. "Were you crying?" Kurama looked away and began to yip its name, as it rubbed its eyes with its front leg. Naruto laughed as he got up, a groan coming from his throat as he did so. His back was killing him, when went to feel, he felt a minor scratch on his back along with a slight tear in his clothing.

_'It's not that bad at least.' _He hears Kurama yipping at him and he looked to see a concern look on its face. "I'm fine buddy." He assured the Pokémon who seemed to yip happily. _'Boy his mood took a one eighty.' _He shook away the thought, "Come on let's head back to camp." Surprisingly the Pokémon listened and began to follow him. _'Wow, I still don't know what happened, but I like the results.'_

_Their camp_

Naruto groaned as he wrapped the bandages around his torso while talking to his mom on the XTranceiver, which she had given him the other day for his journey. "I'm fine mom; it's just a minor scratch."

"_Are you sure?_" His mom asked worried for her little boy.

"Yes mom, I'm fine, I just need some new clothes."

"_Okay, I'll have a delivery man meet you in the nearest poke-mart with some."_

"Thanks mom I'll talk to you later, bye." After her 'Bye sweetie' Naruto turned off the device and put the dark orange sleep shirt on from earlier that day. He could wear it until he got to Boulder City poke-mart and got his extra clothes from his mom. He then noticed Kurama giving the XTranceiver a few sniffs, and a strange look. "This is an XTranceiver, I can use it to talk to my mom, or Professor Sarutobi, or any of my other friends who have one." Kurama still gave it a few strange looks before curling up next to Naruto's sleeping bag. Naruto began to scratch behind his ear softly getting a soft purring sound from the shiny.

As Naruto laid there he began to tell Kurama about himself, his dad, his friends, and his dream. He didn't know if the Vulpix was listening, but he still kept going. Although Kurama was listening, even though he had his eyes closed, he was still paying attention to what the boy had to say. _'I swear I will never ignore you again Whiskers.' _When he heard Naruto's ambition to get a team of Pokémon and train them to be the strongest ever, he couldn't help but smirk. _"I'll help if I can, Naruto." S_oon they both fell asleep.

**Hey Naruto here, oh, it seems that next time I get to catch some more pokemon. What's that Kurama a battle where? Oh boy sure cant wait, check back next time to see the continuation of my pokemon journey. Chapter 2 Welcome to the Team, oh I can't wait to see what happens next.**

**(A/N:Hey 2shadowwriter2 here, how did you like it? Good? Bad? Let me know. This is just a spare time type thing, I'm trying to think up new ideas for some of my original work, and a friend of mine told me to work on my grammar. So let me know if i made any errors, I tried to catch some myself before posting, but i can over look somethings. Well try not to flame I'm new to writing fanfiction so I don't really know the rules all that well. Anyway there is a challange on my profile, check it out and see if it something you would like. well ttfn, ta ta for now.)**


	2. Chapter 2 Welcome to the Team

***Disclamor: The following is a non-profit fan based story.  
****Naruto is the property of Masashi Kishismoto and TV tokyo.  
****Pokemon is the property of Nitendo, Creatures inc. , and GAME FREAK inc.  
****Please support the official realeases.**

***You can now follow me on Twitter, go to my profile for details.**

**Chapter 2  
****Welcome to the Team**

_Dark Forest.._

Morning in the Dark Forest tends to be, dark. However you want to say it the forest in the morning is just as dark as it would be during the day. So with the little to no light, it's obvious that the morning would slip by the unknowing trainer and his Pokémon. Only if the sleeping shiny that was lying next to his trainer wasn't aware of his senses. One sense being that he could feel the morning air, the slightly cold yet warm feeling. With that he yawned and opened his eyes and took in the dimly lit forest before him.

_'Guess Whiskers is still asleep.' _He thought as he looked towards the one in the sleeping bag. The blonde with spikey hair, whisker mark cheeks, he was mumbling a name a name in his sleep. _'Who's this Sakura?' _The shiny asked no one as he observed the still sleeping boy. Then he got a thought on how to wake the blonde. Crouching slightly he prepared to jump, and with a little push he leapt on to the sleeping boys chest. All it did was cause the blonde to shift slightly, but not wake him up. He crawled to his face and pawed his check, still nothing. He crawled off the boy and sighed. He looked around a bit, seeing nothing he could use, although his eyes did land on his tails. This brought an even better thought to his mind. Positioning himself correctly, down with his butt up in the air, he lifted his tails and...

**WHAM**

"Gah!" Yep that worked.

"Kurama why did you do that?" The answer was an innocent smirk, as if the Vulpix was saying 'I have no idea what you are talking about.' So with a scowl on his features, rubbing his sore face and a yawn from his mouth Naruto got up from his sleeping bag. Then began to do some light stretching, getting Kurama to do some along with him. Naruto reached high in the air getting a few satisfying cracks from his spine. He looked to see Kurama arching his back and curling each of his six tails. Looking at the tails Naruto still didn't like the way he was woken up, and subconsciously rubbed his face.

"Come on I'll get us some breakfast and we'll do some training." The Vulpix announced his name indicating that he agreed with his trainer. As Naruto was rummaging through his backpack he couldn't help but think about the events of yesterday. It was still weird how the Vulpix seemed to change his mood so much. Yesterday the fox was burning his face every chance he got, then the shiny ignores Naruto's commands, and the weirdest of all was how he was last night. He acted like the ideal Pokémon partner, but the events of earlier still leaves Naruto with much confusion. As he got the Pokémon food from his bag, and one of the breakfast boxes his mom prepared for him, his thoughts were on the kind of training he should have Kurama do. There were plenty of types of training to choose from, agility, power, accuracy, speed, and others; however these are just some of the few he had in mind.

He set the food for the Pokémon down and sat next to him, then opened his box breakfast. He kept thinking of the training for Kurama, '_where to start?' _The thought was still floating around in his head, he didn't register the sounds of licking lips, a sign that the golden fox was done with his meal.

Kurama was given curious looks towards his trainer, "w_hat's up Whiskers?_"

Naruto turned his attention to the Pokémon, after hearing it yip its name. "What's up, buddy?" He got no answer from the Pokémon, just that same curious stare. "Are you wondering why I'm so quiet?" The Vulpix's stare went from curious to expectant. "Well, I'm just trying to figure out what kind of training for you to do." The Vulpix looked confused so Naruto elaborated for him, "Well, see there are a lot of different ways I can train you," Naruto stood up and resealed his container of breakfast before continuing, "there's speed for one, then agility." Naruto stopped for a moment to revisit his backpack, after putting the box away he began to search for something inside the bag.

"Ah, here we go." He holds up a stop watch, "I'm glad mom left this in there." Before he went to bed on the eve of his departure he had already put a few things in his backpack, the stop watch being one. "With this we can work on your speed, like you can do a **Quick Attack **and then I can see how fast it is." He stopped for a moment to see if he lost the interest of the Pokémon, surprisingly the Vulpix still had an expectant stare in his eyes. "So, from there we can try making it faster, if possible." Now the Vulpix had a look of understanding. Naruto began to rub the back of his head a goofy grin on his face, "but, we would have to teach you **Quick Attack **first." After the declaration, Naruto went to clean up around the camp.

Meanwhile, Kurama was going over in his head all that his trainer said. _'So he has a way for me to get faster? _After the thought he began to wonder, _"I wonder what else you have up your sleeves Whiskers?" _Kurama trotted over to where 'Whiskers' was, over by his sleeping bag rolling it up. He was still getting used to the soothe bell around his neck, the soothing sound it made certainly did make him calmer, but why the tag? _"I'll never understand humans." _He mumbled while watching 'Whiskers' put his pack on.

"Come on Kurama, let's do some training." He said heading to a nearby clearing that he knew of.

_The Clearing_

The area that he and his Pokémon will be training in was a spacious area. There were patches of dirt, mixed in with some of the green of the short grass. Luckily the trees weren't so thick here so there was plenty of light to see. On the far side away from where they were standing was a big boulder amongst several smaller ones. It was a spacious field for them to do the kind of training he wants done.

Walking over to one of the smaller rocks to sit on, Naruto began to search through his bag once again. Along with the stop watch he also pulled out a whistle, and put both around his neck. Then he turned his attention to the awaiting Pokémon. "Okay, to start things off I want you to run around this area at a normal steady pace." He held up the whistle that was hanging around his neck, "When I blow the whistle you start, when I blow it a second time you can stop, sound good?" His answer was a 'Are you crazy?' look, but he just chuckled as he held the whistle to his lips. "Go!"

With a blow of the whistle, Kurama sighed before he took off. He was running at a pace that felt good, it was fast but not his top speed. His eyes darted over to where the blond sat watching him as he continued to run around the area. He began to question this exercise as he noticed his lungs were burning. The muscles in his legs began to burn and scream for him to stop, but he ignored the plea and decided that he should just trust the blonde trainer. Maybe when he is done killing his legs his trainer will tell him what the point of all this was.

Naruto was actually proud that Kurama did this exercise without complaint. It showed that Kurama was beginning to trust him; he was just hoping he didn't screw up like yesterday. He was still blaming himself for Kurama getting in that deep with that flock of Spearow's and there leader. He turned his attention back to the running Pokémon, he could see that he was beginning to slow down. He decided that the fox had enough, so he blew the whistle.

At the sound of the whistle for the second time Kurama fell to the ground after stopping, panting hard. He could barely stand, he felt as though his legs were rubber goo. He did _not_ want to do that again. When he saw the blonde approaching him he tried to stand up, but finding it to be a mere fantasy to do so. His trainer bent down and held a small bluish round thing with several tiny black dots. He gave a sniff before taking it into his mouth. Again showing blind faith, something he was still curious about. While  
chewing he found it had a rather sweet citrus like taste. Another thing he noticed was that he was beginning to feel better, much better actually. He hopped up and ran in small circles for a bit. He then turned his attention to his trainer begging for more. Sitting on his back legs, front paws up and bent.

"You like that?" Naruto chuckled. "That was an Oran Berry; it helps a Pokémon regain strength." He then fiddled with a long tube like object with a poke-ball like top, in his other hand. The device popped out a reddish square. "Here, a treat for working so hard." He tossed the block to the awaiting Pokémon, who caught it with little to no effort.

The second substance Kurama had gotten from the blonde was spicy yet sweet, and tasted amazing, whatever it was he wanted more. _"Hey, can I have more?" _He yipped to his trainer as he went up and put his left front paw on the blonde's leg while his right was curled. He was giving the puppy dog look a try.

"Oh, do you want more?" His answer was more yips and barks of the Pokémon's name. "Sorry buddy, but it's a special treat." He chuckled at the Pokémon's depressed look. "However, you do get more when you do well at training." The Pokémon seemed to perk up at that. "I'm glad you like them though, I helped my mom make them, and they're called poke-blocks." He laughed how the Pokémon seemed so eager to train some more. "Okay, okay we'll get back to training, next I think we'll work on your agility."

However, before they can start they hear what sounds like Pokémon arguing. Deciding it was worth a look see, he and Kurama went over to the sounds to check out what the problem was.

_The other clearing_

When they got to where they heard the sounds, they both had confused looks on their faces. Naruto could honestly say that he has never seen anything like the scene before him. The best way to describe it would be a fight circle, with a random assortment of Pokémon making up the circle. After getting closer they could make out the two fighters. One being the average size Machop, the other was one that Naruto hasn't seen around in the forest before. He was trying to remember the Pokémon's name but he was drawing a blank. He then remembers Dexter in his back pants pocket. He reached back and pulled the orange device out and then scanned the small bi-pedal dog looking creature.

_Bing!_

_Riolu-The Emanation Pokémon-It has the peculiar power to see emotion such as joy and rage in waves._

_'Oh yeah, I think dad has an evolved form of Riolu.' _He couldn't believe he forgot that little detail about his father. Although the Riolu before him seemed to be a bit smaller than the average Riolu, Naruto began to silently observe the Pokémon as it seemed they were almost done sizing each other up.

Kurama, after hearing the strange device, was also wondering about the small Pokémon. From what he could hear from the circle it seemed that the Machop was the type to pick on other Pokémon.

_With the Pokémon_

Riolu was ticked; he did not like this Machop. For one, he was a bully, two he was picking on a poor Caterpie, and three he acted like he wasn't doing anything wrong. _"You going to fight or stare at me, runt." _Riolu scowled at the Machop, he didn't like bullies, or being called names. So when the Machop called him 'runt' he did what he always would do.

"_Ahh!" _He charged in towards the Machop, with blue glowing paws, trying to land a hit on the snarky Pokémon. Though the Machop seemed to smirk as he blocked his attempts, he caught a paw and winced slightly at the pain of the **Force Palm**, but he shook it off and pulled back his other fist and threw the punch at the small Pokémon's gut. _"Gah!" _Air left his lungs as he flew away from the Machop. The other Pokémon moved out of the way of the Riolu that was coming towards them. Of course the Riolu hit one of the nearby trees, after the impact he fell to the ground.

"_Tch, stay down if you know what's good for ya, idiot." _The Machop began to laugh, "_You're too weak to beat me._" The statement seemed to be the right motivation the small Pokémon needed to get up.

"_Don't," _his eyes began to glow a dark blue, _"don't call me WEAK!" _With another battle cry, Riolu ran towards the Machop his paws once again glowing blue. He dodges a right hook, and ducked under a left hook. He thrusts his paw upward sending a **Force Palm **to the bullies chin. He was sent flying upward as Riolu flew off the ground slightly before landing on his feet. The Machop, however, landed on his back. Riolu thought he won, as his eyes lost the bluish color to them and went to their normal red color. He was shocked that the Machop began to get up, and spat some red liquid from his mouth.

"_You'll pay for that runt." _He wiped some of the liquid from his lips.

"_Alright, teme, eat this." _The small Pokémon said in a too cocky of a tone, he then put his paws behind him, one over the other. He began to focus as a small blue orb started to form in between his hands, but before it could get any bigger it popped. _"Huh?" _The Riolu looked at his paws wondering what happened. His momentarily loss of focus was taking advantage of by the bigger Pokémon. Riolu took a right hook to his left cheek, then a left hook to his right, followed by a flying axe kick to his skull that sent him to the ground.

"_Wow, you're not just weak, you're pathetic." _The Machop and the other Pokémon began to laugh at the expense of the down Pokémon. They soon started to go their separate ways still laughing at the small Pokémon.

_'I'm sorry I'm so weak, dad.' _Unconsciousness soon took over as the small Pokémon let the darkness take him

Kurama, who heard everything, felt for the small Pokémon. He too was called weak, and from what 'Whiskers' told him last night, he too knew. Even though the blonde had no idea what all was said.

Naruto, however, was shocked by the move the Riolu was about to do. Even though it didn't work it was still very rare and almost unheard of for a Riolu to be able to even attempt an **Aura Sphere**. Taking in that the Pokémon was out cold, Naruto made his way towards the small Pokémon. He bent down and checked its features; he was just unconscious, took an extra Oran Berry out of his pocket and put it inside the Pokémon's mouth. The Pokémon began to chew the berry and after a few moments, he began to open his eyes. He jumped up and got into a stance, the Riolu barked his name as his paws began to glow.

"Whoa whoa, calm down I was just trying to help." The Pokémon didn't show signs of calming down, so Naruto looked to his Pokémon. "Can you talk to him?"

Kurama stepped forward and began to try and calm the blue Pokémon down. Riolu shifted to the Vulpix not leaving his stance. _"Who are you?" _He asked Kurama.

"_Calm down will ya, we're not here to hurt you." _He didn't change his stance. Kurama sighed, _"I'm called Kurama, and this is Whi-uhm, Naruto." _The Riolu still didn't change his stance. _"You, got a name?"_

"_Not like yours, I don't have a human." _Riolu got out of his stance but still has his muscles tensed just in case.

"_Oh, well if I know Whiskers, that's what I call him, he'll probably want to help you out."_

"_What do you mean?" _He asked feeling paranoid about the situation.

"_I mean that Whiskers here might be able to help you master that move you tried._" Kurama smirked as the Riolu was beginning to consider the offer.

"_R-really?" _He asked with a little bit of hope in his eyes.

"_Yeah he might even, be able to help you evolve." _That seemed to be the tug that was needed to get the Riolu hooked.

"_He will?" _He finally relaxed as he began to picture his evolution.

Kurama could see that he had the Pokémon interested. _"Yes, I've only known him for a while but he's different from most humans." _He looked to the tag on his collar, _"He seems to care, a lot, about any Pokémon." _He was being honest there, he still didn't know what it was but the blonde seemed like the type to sacrifice himself to save someone close to him.

"_You're serious aren't you?" _At the nod, Riolu began to think about it, he never thought about joining with a human, but if what the oddly colored Vulpix said was true. _"Okay, I'll come with."_

Kurama smirked as he looked to the blonde, '_I told you I would help you with your dream, Whiskers.'_

Naruto had no idea what all was said between the two, but the jest of it was obvious when the Riolu dropped to his knees and bowed before Naruto.

"_Please train me Naruto-sensei." _The Riolu barked softly.

Naruto, having no idea what the Pokémon said, looked to Kurama to see him laughing at the display the small Pokémon was portraying. "You wanna come with us?" The Riolu looked up with a pleading and determined look in his eyes. That was good enough for Naruto. "Awesome, welcome to the team," he paused as he started to think of a good name for the Pokémon. "Ah, I got it," he snapped his fingers, "I'll call you Valor." The Pokémon seemed to approve of the name. Naruto pulled one of his poke-balls from his belt, after enlarging it he touched it to the Pokémon's head. It snapped open as Riolu was engulfed in a red light and sucked into the ball. The ball only twitch slightly before it beeped, indicating a successful capture. He tossed the ball in the air then caught it as it came down, thrusting his arm forward in a good guy pose. "We got, Riolu." He then looked towards the ball, then to Kurama. _'I don't know what you did Kurama, but thanks.' _They then went back to the clearing to get Naruto's backpack, and then they headed off on the road to Boulder City.

_A couple hours later..._

Naruto and Kurama's stomach both made a growling sound, they looked at each other as a look of agreement was shared. He then led the way to a small clearing he knew of. "This looks like a good place for lunch." After the declaration, he dropped his pack to the floor and picked Valor's poke-ball off his belt. "Come on out, Valor!" He tossed the ball in the air, it popped open letting out a bluish light before it formed the Riolu now known as Valor.

"_Uh, where are we?_" Valor asked aloud. However Naruto of course didn't understand him.

"_Lunch time, baka, hope you're hungry." _The shiny answered the small Pokémon's question.

"_Hey, don't call me baka, fox-teme." _Kurama smirked as he trotted over to Naruto to wait for his food. With a scowl Valor joined him, also feeling hungry for some lunch.

"Here you go guys, eat up." He set down two bowls with some nutritious Pokémon food. Kurama dug into his without any thought.

However Valor tried to show some manners. _"Thanks for the food, Naruto-sensei." _He bowed his head then began to eat his food, slow at first but found himself shoveling the food into his mouth. He seemed to act as if this was his last meal.

Naruto chuckled as he began to eat his box lunch. "I see you guys like my mom's cooking." He laughed a bit. "The main ingredient is Oran Berries, so it will give you guys more strength for training or battles." He continued to eat his lunch, smiling at his small two Pokémon team. He couldn't help but laugh, he was really on his way to becoming a great trainer. "Don't worry if we run out, my mom showed me how to make it. All I need is the right supplies, but that has to wait 'til we get to Boulder City." He stood up and put the empty box back in his pack. He went and gathered the Pokémon's empty bowls and put them away. He shouldered his pack as he led them both to a bigger clearing that was close to theirs.

"This looks good." He dropped his pack after getting the stop watch and whistle, he didn't notice Kurama's scowl directed towards the objects. He put them around his neck; he then used his foot to draw a line in the ground. Afterwards he went to the other side of the clearing, somewhere between fifteen to twenty feet, and did the same almost exactly across from the other line. When he came back he got curious looks from his Pokémon. "I'm sure you're wondering why I did that." They only stared and waited for an answer. "Well I'm going to try and teach you guys **Quick Attack.**" They seemed confused, so with a sigh he tried to explain the exercise. "Basically, you'll take turns running from one end to the other, as fast as you can." He held up the stop watch, "with this I'll be able to see how fast it is and try to get you to increase your speed each time." They seemed to understand it a bit more after he explained it. "You guys ready?" Kurama stepped up to the line first, Naruto smiled at his enthusiasm. He put the whistle to lips. "Go!"

_An hour later.._

"Good job guys." Naruto smiled at his Pokémon, they were now eating an Oran Berry each. "If you two keep working on it you guys will have **Quick Attack **down in no time." He then gave Kurama a reddish block, he seemed eager to receive one. He then offered a pinkish block to Valor, "Here, it's a treat for working so hard."

Valor took the block and sniffed; he put it in his mouth and chewed. His taste buds began to tickle as the sweetness of the poke-block exploded in his mouth. His eyes widened at the great taste of the treat. _'Oh my, that is the best thing I have ever tasted.' _He heard laughter from next to him; he turned to see the shiny Vulpix grinning at him. _"What?"_

"_Nothing, I had the same reaction when I tried my first poke-block." _Kurama chuckled at the memory of earlier that day.

"_Is that what they're called, poke-blocks?" _Valor never heard of them before.

"_Yeah, and Whiskers will only give us one if we work hard during training. I'd do anything for one of 'em."_

"Alright, hope you guys are well rested," Naruto spoke up, "'cause I still got something that I want you both to do." He turned to Kurama, "for you, I'm going to try and teach you **Iron Tail**, well at least the exercises to do so." He had the Vulpix follow him over to a couple of tree stumps. "Now, I want you to use you tail to beat these tree stumps." Kurama had a shocked look on his face, "yes I'm serious, once you at least busted or even cracked one, move on to the other. Continue this until you've either done all three or your tail gets numb, really numb." The shiny had a horrified look on his face, the blonde sighed, "look we need to strengthen your tail, that way you'll be closer to learning **Iron Tail**." The Pokémon seemed to understand, "Okay you can start now."

_'I hate you Whiskers.' _Kurama began to beat the first of the three stumps as hard as he could, he winced with each hit.

Naruto then went over to a series of boulders, he then called Valor over, "now I want you to focus as much power as you can into a **Force Palm**, and strike this boulder." Valor had a confused look in his eyes. "The object is to shatter the boulder in at least one hit." The small Pokémon still held confusion in his features. "If you can shatter a boulder with one **Force Palm**, than you will be able to focus that same amount of aura to try and pull off an **Aura Sphere**." Now the Pokémon had a look of shock, "yeah, I figure your problem might be that you aren't used to focusing that much aura for the attack."

Valor no longer had any doubts in this exercise, _'if Naruto-sensei says it will help than I'll do this exercise.' _He then walked up to the boulder and waited for his teachers command.

"Okay, you can start now." With that the Pokémon then began his exercise. Naruto walked over to the far side to observe them both training.

"_Hey, gaki, _*grunt*_ how you _*grunt* _doing over *_grunt_* there?" _Kurama called to the other Pokémon, has he was bashing his almost numb tail on the second stump, barely getting a crack out of the hunk of wood.

"_I'm, ha, doing, ha, well, ha, you?" _He answered while thrusting his paw forward but only after he focused as much aura he could into the punch.

"_Tail *_grunt_* getting _*grunt* _numb._" He did one more hit, but this time before his tail hit, it glowed slightly before hitting the stump. The result was a huge crack in the top of the sump, almost like it was sliced through. The cut wasn't deep; however, it was still better than the first attempt. With the first stump there was only a light crack. He then looked at his poor tail, and saw that there were many cuts and red liquid splotched in places. He then heard Naruto approaching, when he looked up he saw that Naruto had a couple of Oran Berries. When he offered both he took them and almost instantly his tail felt better. He also felt like his tail was stronger, he's not saying he wants to do the exercise again, but he felt like he could. He also saw that his tail was also fully healed, aside to the drying blood, it looked good as new. Something else was held up to him, not one but _two _poke-blocks.

"You deserve them, you did a great job Kurama, if you keep that up you'll learn **Iron Tail**, in no time." He then scratched behind the Pokémon's ear as the shiny ate his treats. He then got up and walked over to Valor, Kurama on his heels. He saw that Valor was making some good progress; there was already a large crack in the boulder. "You can stop now Valor." He gave the Pokémon an Oran Berry. "Good job, buddy." He pats his head, and gave him two pink poke-blocks. The Riolu ate them both happily. "Okay, return Valor." He held up the poke-ball, a red light shot out from the whited button and hit Valor, changing him into red light as he was sucked back into the red and white ball. "Let's go Kurama." They walked out of the clearing and back on the path to Boulder City. Kurama hoped up and got a ride on Naruto's right shoulder. This caused Naruto to laugh and scratch the shiny behind the ear, before continuing on his journey.

_Close to sunset_

Naruto could tell that they have been walking for a while now. Just by the orange blue color of the sky above him. He began to look for a safe place to set up camp and give some dinner to his Pokémon. He was able to find a small clearing, plenty of free spaces for his sleeping bag. So having Kurama jump off his shoulder, he drops his pack to the ground, and starts to gather rocks and wood for a small fire to keep him warm. After gathering the needed supplies, he had Kurama use a small **Ember** attack. This way was better and it saved on matches. He lets Valor out of his ball and starts to get dinner ready for them.

"_Where are we?" _The Riolu asked as he took in his surroundings.

"_We're still in the Dark Forest, baka." _Was the reply of the shiny.

"_I know that fox-teme." _He shook a paw at the fox Pokémon. _"I meant in the Dark Forest."_

"_Just a small clearing, Whiskers is getting us some of that delicious food."_

Riolu's eyes glazed over as he thought about the food he had tried earlier that day. Some drool was coming from the Pokémon's muzzle. "Come and get it guys." He heard the call of his teacher and walked over to where his bowl lay. Kurama using an almost perfect **Quick Attack**, needless to say he had gotten there before the smaller Pokémon could.

"_Thanks for the meal, Naruto-sensei." _The Riolu bowed before digging into his meal.

Naruto smiled at his Pokémon, he liked how Valor always bowed as if saying thanks before eating his food. _'If only Kurama would use the same manners.' _He looked towards the fox Pokémon, sure he was more obedient during training, and maybe in a battle, but he could tell the Pokémon was still a bit mischievous. This was probably just in his nature, after all Vulpix's are mischievous little creatures. Now finish with his food, he noticed that the Pokémon were done as well. "Okay Valor time for bed," he held up Valor's ball, "return." The Pokémon went back into the ball with no complaints.

Naruto was about to get into his sleeping bag, but he noticed a series of yellow lights, then heard the sound of a tree falling hitting the ground. Curious, he heads over to the area where he saw the lights, Kurama hot on his heels. Before he gets to the area, he sees the yellow light again, along with hearing the tree falling.

When he finally comes to the edge of a clearing he sees a Pichu, but something was off about it. Sure it had the black edge around its diamond shaped ears, the black tuff of fur around its neck, and the black tail. No what were off were two things, the first was that it was a dark yellow, instead of the light yellow of a normal Pichu. The color was the same of a Pikachu's fur color. The other thing that was off was its cheeks, again not the normal color of a Pichu's cheeks. This one's cheeks had the same red circles you would find on a Pikachu.

He scanned the Pichu with Dexter, but nothing special came up. Just that it was a girl and the normal picture of a Pichu, along with the normal data that he already knew. It was weird, this Pikachu colored Pichu; he could tell she was strong, just by the attack she was using on the trees. He saw the Pichu pant a bit before sending a powerful electric attack at another tree, the tree also having the same fate as the others. _'No doubt, that's a **Thunder Bolt **attack.' _Naruto was shocked, Pichu normally doesn't learn an attack like that until it evolves or is taught. The Pichu is breathing hard now; the powerful attack was most likely having a negative effect on her.

Suddenly the mouse Pokémon falls forward, and Naruto rushes forward to check on her. Kurama was hurrying to catch up with him. Just as Naruto was about to touch her sparks came off the Pokémon, Naruto grits his teeth as the shock runs through him, before finally grabbing the oddly colored Pichu. Soon the sparks die, the Pichu opens her eyes briefly, and Naruto is able to see another strange thing about this Pokémon. The Pichu had ocean blue eyes, which sparkled a bit before they were gone, back behind the tired Pokémon's eyelids.

"Wow, she sure is special." Naruto smiled, before heading back to his and Kurama's camp.

_Their Camp_

When Naruto got back he gave the Pichu a few Oran Berries. When she awoke, her blue eyes widen in shock, and would have scurried off had it not been that she was in Naruto's arms. "Hey don't worry, we're just helping you." He gave the Pichu a small yellow block, who sniffed it at first, then looked into Naruto's own blue eyes. "Go on, it's good I promise." She seemed to trust him a little as she carefully took the yellow block in her mouth.

Her eyes widen again, but not out of fear, but because of the sweet yet sour flavor of the block. Her favorite combination, '_Oh my, that's, that's._' She couldn't find the words to describe the amazing flavor of the substance.

"_That's called a poke-block." _She looked toward the voice and her cheeks redden more than normal. She has never seen a Vulpix that was almost the same yellow as she was. She also found him to be a little cute.

"_Wh-who are you?_" She couldn't believe she was stammering. '_Why am I like this?_' When the golden Vulpix flashed a smile she blushed some more.

"_I'm Kurama, and this baka next to me is Valor."_

"_Shut it fox-teme." _She then took notice of the other Pokémon, just an average Riolu, except he was smaller than normal. He then smiled a goofy grin. _"Hello." _He waved.

"You alright there Pichu?" She turned her attention away from the Vulpix, Kurama, and focused on the blonde still holding her. "Your cheeks are redder than normal."

Pichu leapt from his arms and landed in front of him. She squeaked her name, as if telling him she was fine. "Okay," he scratched his whiskered cheek, "Say, uh, Pichu, would you like to join our team." The Pichu looked towards Naruto. "See, if you want I might be able to help you get stronger, if you want."

"_Naruto-sensei can help, he's helping us._" She turned to the small Riolu, Valor.

"_Really?" _She squeaked.

"_Yeah, he can." _This came from Kurama.

She blushed again and turned away, _"O-okay, Kurama-kun." _She blushed again before patting the blonde's leg.

Naruto bent down, "what's up?" The Pichu pointed to one of his poke-balls, and chattered her name. "You wanna come with us?" The Pichu nodded, "okay, well let's see." He racked his brain for a name. When he looked into the Pichu's blue eyes he saw the ocean in his mind's eye. "Puka." He couldn't help but think of all the Puka shells him and his mom, who loved the ocean, always collected when they would visit his mom's home town. The memory came back to him when he looked into the Pichu's eyes. "That's what I'll call you, Puka." He then got a poke-ball off his belt and touched it to Puka's head. She was sucked into the ball via a red light, and then the ball beeped, not even twitching. "Cool, we got, a Pichu." His Pokémon cheered with him. _'Welcome to the team, Puka'_

Soon it was bed time, after returning Valor to his ball, he and Kurama soon fell asleep. Naruto couldn't help but smile. _'Just you wait dad.'_

_The next day.._

Luckily today Naruto was awake before Kurama could have a chance to whack him again with his tails. No doubt the Pokémon would have used the same force on him as he did with the stumps yesterday. So with a yawn he got up and let out his two new Pokémon. Puka was the first one out; she let out a soft yawn, but blushes when she saw Kurama. The next one was Valor, who let out a big yawn before looking around. "Alright guys let's do some stretching." They each did their own set of stretches. Kurama was arching his back and curling his six tails. Puka was reaching her left arm up while bending to her right, occasionally switching sides. Valor was doing slight twists with his upper body. Naruto was reaching high and bending backwards, trying to get the kinks out of his back.

When they were done with stretching Naruto got bowls of Pokémon food for the three, then set them down for each Pokémon. Then he sat down to finish his breakfast from yesterday, it's a good thing it was still good enough to eat. "After we eat, we'll do some light training. Then we'll head back on our journey." He dug into his breakfast.

Naruto found a nice clearing after he put the bowls, his sleeping bag, and his empty container away. He set his pack down and told them their instructions. "Okay, to start I want you three to run around this clearing." He held up the whistle, "when I blow on this whistle you can start, you stop when you hear it again."

"_Word of warning, start at an even pace." _Kurama got in before Naruto blew the whistle.

Confused by the Vulpix's words, Valor ignored him and decided to break off ahead of the others. _"No you baka I said go at an even pace." _But the Riolu didn't hear the shinny's reply. Kurama sighed as he and Puka went at a normal steady pace.

"_Kurama-kun," _Puka started as she tried to keep up with the golden Vulpix.

"_Yeah?"_

"_Why did you suggest _*pant* _going at a _*pant* _normal pace._" She had a hard time getting the sentence out.

"_Well, 'cause otherwise _*pant*_ you'd get tired _*pant*_ easily" _He got out having a hard time, like the Pichu had.

At the sound of the whistle Valor fell forward breathing hard. While Puka, who took Kurama's advice, and Kurama himself, were just catching their breath. "Good job guys." He turned to Valor after giving the other two an Oran Berry. "Next time, Valor, try starting out at a good pace, like Kurama and Puka did. It's not a race." Naruto gave the Pokémon an Oran Berry as well. "Okay next up is agility training."

He went into the woods and got a bunch of thick sticks, and stuck them each in the ground. Enough to where they would stay sturdy. There were ten in total and they were in a type of zigzagged line. "Okay, one at a time I want you to take turns going through these sticks." He gestured to the obstacle course. "If you hit a stick, or if you get through them all your done. Then the next in line goes. It'll go like this until you each have tried five times. Then we're done and you each get a treat." At the promise of a treat, they all perked up. "Okay, Kurama you're up first." He put the whistle to his lips. "Go!"

_Back on the path.._

Naruto was walking down the path again towards Boulder City. He couldn't believe he was on his third day of traveling and still wasn't there yet. Of course he had been taking long breaks to train his Pokémon. It's probably something his other friends haven't done since they got them. Sasuke maybe, but he doesn't know about the others. They all probably just went straight to Boulder City, only taking stops when necessary. Naruto wasn't worried; he knew his dad would still be champion by the time he got to him. He was training his Pokémon so that they will be able to stand against his dad's team when the time came. Still he wanted to enjoy his journey, not rush through it just to prove himself.

"My God you are a weak and pathetic Pokémon." Naruto looked ahead after hearing the statement. He saw a kid around his age, wearing a black school uniform, long bushy red hair, and mean eyes. The Pokémon he was directing his glare towards has a blue body, white face with three black freckles on each cheek, and white arms. The Pokémon also had Navy blue colored feet, tail, and ears. Also on its face was a big round brown nose. Naruto also took notice of the yellow seashell on its belly.

The Pokémon looked down a sad look in its eyes. "Tch, I've already caught a better Pokémon than you. I don't even want you anymore."

After hearing the declaration Naruto couldn't contain his anger. "Hey, asshole!" The red head took notice of him. "What the hell are you doing?" Naruto made his way towards the red head.

"Who are you?" The boy asked.

"Naruto."

"Naruto? The fishcake?"

"Shut up asshole!" Naruto was steaming now. "Who the hell are you, and why are you talking to that poor Oshawott that way."

"Well, fishcake," the boy smirked when he got a rise out of Naruto. "My name is Shoji, and this weakling is Neptune, not that he lives up to the name."

"Hey, there is no such thing as a weak Pokémon, only weak trainers." Naruto declared, getting a shocked look from the Oshawott, known as Neptune, while he got an angry look from the red head known as Shoji.

"You calling me weak?"

"What if I am?" Naruto crossed his arms.

"Alright how 'bout this. We'll battle, if you win you get the weakling." He gestured to the Oshawott, who dawned a sad look. "If I win, you give me that golden Vulpix."

"No way, Pokémon aren't just things you bet with, bastard." Both Kurama and Neptune looked at Naruto with awe.

"Fine, then I'll just continue to treat this pathetic beast how he should be treated." He said giving the Oshawott a kick.

Naruto's eyes flashed with anger, but he felt a slight tug on his pants, he looked down to see Kurama giving him a determined look and a nod. "You sure buddy?" The Vulpix nodded again. "Okay." He turned to the red head, "deal, if I win you let Neptune go, and if you win...you can have Kurama." He hated saying it; it felt like venom in his mouth.

The other boy smirked, "say good-bye to that Vulpix."

"Let's just battle."

"Okay, but we only use one Pokémon and not the one we're betting."

Naruto nodded his hand going to Puka's ball. The boy threw his choice in first, "Go, Pidge." With a pop of the poke-ball bluish white light came out before forming a Pidgeotto.

"Let's go, Puka!" Naruto threw his own ball when it popped and released its own bluish white light Puka, the Pikachu colored Pichu, appeared. Sparks came off her cheeks and a determined look in her blue eyes.

"A freaky colored Pichu, ha, nice choice." Shoji began to laugh at both Naruto and Puka. Puka, Naruto, and Kurama all grew angry at the red head. "Take them down Pidge."

"_You're going down girlie." _The bird cawed.

"_Oooh, such big words." _Puka taunted.

The bird had an angry look after that comment. _"Take this." _He fired a **Gust **attack, at his trainers command. Puka easily dogged it thanks to her flexibility and that training from earlier.

"_Oh, that would have hit me, if I was a _bird _brained stump._" She kept taunting the Pidgeotto.

"_Why you," _At the next command of his trainer, his wings glowed white as he came down for a **Wing Attack**. _"Eat this bitch."_

Puka jumped high in the air easily dodging the attack. "Now, Puka use **Thunder Bolt**."

"_Nighty night, bird brain." _Her cheeks sparked a bit before a huge yellow lightning bolt came from the little Pokémon.

"_Ahh!" _The Pidgeotto shrieked as it was hit with the powerful attack.

When she landed Puka was breathing hard, as sparks danced around her body, but a smirk was in place. _'Did you see that, Kurama-kun?' _She mentally called out to the golden fox.

"Good job Puka, you deserve a nice rest." Naruto said as he returned Puka to her ball.

"No fair you cheated." The red head declared.

"Pfft, sore loser." Naruto smirked and crossed his arms.

"Fine just get the damn weakling out of my sight." He threw a poke-ball at Naruto who caught it with ease.

"I told you already, there's-"

"Yeah, yeah whatever." He cut Naruto off, who frowned. The red head then turned and started to walk off. "Smell ya 'round."

"That guy's a prick." Naruto than bent down to Oshawott's level. "Hey, Neptune was it?" The Pokémon nodded. "Look, don't listen to what that prick said. I can tell just by looking at you that you've got plenty of potential." Once again Neptune awed at this trainer. "So you wanna come with us?" He said as he stood up.

Neptune was looking between Naruto and Kurama. He then thought to what the blonde had said. _'There is no such thing as a weak Pokémon, only weak trainers.'_ He then nodded.

"Hn, welcome to the team, Neptune." He held the ball up and returned Neptune to his ball.

_A few hours later.._

Naruto could see Boulder City in the distance. Most of the buildings were made out of stone. While others were your averagely made buildings. The most notable feature was the large boulders as tall as a house surrounding the city. This is why it is called Boulder City. "Look Kurama we're almost there." The Vulpix on his shoulder looked towards the city and yipped. "Yeah, I'm excited too boy."

Before he and Kurama could go any further they heard a cawing sound that they would never forget. When he turned he saw the same flock of Spearow's heading towards them, with the Fearow out in front. "Oh no." Naruto groaned. But then Kurama yipped and hopped down from the blondes shoulder. He now stood in front of him. "Hn, your right, no more running." He grabbed three poke-balls from his belt and threw them in the air. "Let's do it guys."

The four Pokémon all stood with determined looks in their eyes. Fire began to gather in Kurama's mouth. Puka's cheeks started to spark. Valor's eyes and front paws glowed blue as he got into a fighting stance. Neptune looked to the others and saw the determined look, then dawned one as well as he pulled the seashell from his belly. Soon the flock will regret ever coming after Naruto again.

**Hello young trainers, I am Hiruzen Sarutobi, but most people call me the Pokemon Proffesor. I'm here to tell you a little bit about the next chapter. It seems that Naurto and his team arrive in Boulder City, where he is challenged to a battle by one of his friends. Also the gym leader isn't taking any challengers, due to him being to absorbed in his art. There also seems to be some thieves wanting to still his art. Can Naruto tear the art obssed freak away long enough for a battle? Will anyone be able to stop the thieves from stealing the art? Well I guess we all will have to check back next time in chapter 3 BANG! Boulder City. I wonder how it all will turn out? Hmm.**

**(A/N I hoped you all enjoyed this chapter, I was so excited by some of the reviews for chapter one I couldn't wait to get this chapter up. So keep the good reviews coming and I'll keep the chapters coming as fast as posible. Also don't dis me on the Pichu, I thought it was creative, so yeah Naruto has two special pokemon. Also the OC Shoji, is based off the duche bag from Pokemon Silver, Gold, Soul Silver, and Heart Gold, just letting ya know. Well I'm almost done outlining chapter 3 so as soon as I'm done typing and editing the chapter I'll upload, until then keep those positive reviews coming. Ttfn, ta ta for now.)**


	3. Chapter 3 BANG! Boulder City

***Disclamor: The following is a non-profit fan based story.  
****Naruto is the property of Masashi Kishismoto and TV tokyo.  
****Pokemon is the property of Nitendo, Creatures inc. , and GAME FREAK inc.  
****Please support the official realeases.**

***You can now follow me on Twitter, go to my profile for details.**

**Chapter 3  
****BANG! Boulder City**

_Boulder City_

Naruto was overwhelmed by the size of this city, even though he has been through here before he is still in awe. The buildings are all twice the size to what he is used to in his home town. He looked to Kurama, who was on his shoulder, he looked tired, just like his other pokemon. After the battle with the Spearow and their leader, Kurama along with the others were tired. Naruto didn't really have enough Oran Berries, which is why he was glad he was in Boulder City now. Before he goes off to battle the gym leader he needs to rest his pokemon. So when he looked up he saw the Pokemon Center, the building where you can fully heal your pokemon. This way they would be prepared for his battle, or more training.

The glass doors binged before they slided open, Kurama seemed to be a bit surprised by the doors. "Don't worry buddy their just automatic doors." The pokemon seemed to be a bit relaxed after that, so Naruto made his way towards the front desk. Where he saw a woman with short light red hair, wearing a pokemon nurse uniform.

"Hello, my name is Nurse Joy, how may I help you?" Naruto smiled at the woman, he than noticed a Blissey, which was the evovled form of Chansey, wearing a nurse hat.

He put Kurama on the table along with three poke-balls. "My pokemon need to be healed and could use a good rest. Maybe a check up to."

The pokemon nurse smiled, "sure thing we will have them back to you in about an hour." She than jestured to a set of stairs going up. "Feel free to use one of our free rooms for pokemon trainers." She than jestured to a hallway on her left, Naruto's right. "Also we have a free buffet for all pokemon trainers." She looked to Naruto, "if you need a room or you want the free buffet you will have to use your trainer I.D."

Naruto held up his poke-dex, "will this work?"

The woman smiled, "yes that is perfect, to register for a room, or to partake in the buffet just follow the directions on various sighns that will help you."

"Thanks Nurse Joy." Naruto smiled, "Please take care of them, and Kurama here," He gestured to the Vulpix, "he doesn't like poke-balls."

"Oh, no problem, we will take good care of your pokemon, now I just need to see your trainer I.D."

"Sure thing," he handed her his poke-dex, "here you go."

"Thank you." She bowed as she took the device. She then stuck it into a small slot on her terminal computer. The screen behind her lit up with Naruto's information. "Oh, your the champion's son, it's a pleasure Namikaze-sama."

Naruto imediatlly had a depressed look, as the nurse had stars in her eyes. "Uh, yeah sure. Anyway my pokemon."

She got a surprised and embarassed look on her face. "Sorry Namikaze-sama." She began to press a series of buttons. Than the poke-dex ejected, "here you go, I got all I need if we need you one of my assistants," she pointed to Blissey, "will be able to find you through your poke-dex."

"Okay, thanks Nurse Joy, later Kurama, you'll be safe here until you're all better." With a wave from Naruto, Kurama and the three poke-balls, were wheeled to the back on a silver tray.

With that done Naruto made his way out of the Pokemon Center, he was looking for the city's poke-mart. Which really was a task easier said than done, the city was huge. However, luck was on his side, he saw a blue roofed building and knew that was the poke-mart. When he got into the building, he saw a delivery man looking around. The man saw Naruto and went straight for him, smiling.

"Naruto Namikaze?" At Naruto's nod the smile on the man's face grew, "great, I have a package here for you from your mother." He handed the package to Naruto, than pulled out a type of PDA. "Sighn here please." The man handed Naruto the device, who sighned near the X. "Great, well have a nice day, sir." He tipped his hat and was out the door.

"Weird." Naruto muttered. Beofore he left he saw a book, titled 'Guide to Elena.' When he looked on the back of the book for information, he saw that this book contains all the basic information on the eight Elena Gyms. Including info. on the leaders themselves. So he went and bought a copy. It couldn't hurt to do a little research on your opponents. With that done he went back to the center to get himself a room so he could change out of his dirty clothes.

_The Pokemon Center_

When Naruto got to where the rooms were he saw a long hallway with various doors on either side. Above each one was a light, the way he saw it, meant that a red light is to indicate that the room is taken. Green light meant that a room is open. So going to the nearest green lit door he read the insturctions that were on a screen above a rectangular slot. It was on the right side, next to the door knob. 'Insert poke-dex into slot below.' It sounded simple enough, so he took out his poke-dex and inserted it into the slot. He was shocked slightly when the screen lit up and a computerized voice sounded. _"Welcome Naruto Namekaze." _With that the door opened and the light above switched to red. _"To re-enter your room just stick your poke-dex back into the slot." _The poke-dex poped back out. _"Good bye and have a nice day." _Naruto grabbed his poke-dex and went into his temporary room. When he closed the door he flicked the light on. The room was nice, a lot of white though, the walls were white, the sheets were white, even the door was white.

"Wow, that's a lot of white." He threw his pack onto the only bed in the room and sat on the edge, then oppened the package from his mom. The first thing he noticed was a note on top of the clothes. He unfolded it and read it silently.

_Naruto,_

_Sorry I couldn't find exact replicas to your clothes, but I hope you enjoy these. I feel like you will. I'm really glad your okay, and call me when you open this package so I know that your okay. I'm also very sorry your original traveling clothes had gotten torn. Well I look forward to hearing from you, stay out of trouble and please be safe._

_Mom_

Naruto had to smile, he looked at his new clothes, which also included new pants. So he went into the small bathroom in the room to take a shower.

_A Few Minutes Later..._

Naruto was now clean and dressed in his new outfit. A black shirt, with a fire emblem on the front chest area. A sleevless orange hoodie, with a black hood. Dark blue cargo pants, along with his original pair of shoes. The other new additon to his atire was a pair of green strapped goggles around his forehead. He than left his room to make his way towards the cafeteria, making sure he had his pokedex he left his room. When he did he noticed something he didn't before, a small netted hamper for dirty clothes, a screen above it lit up when he noticed it. _"If you like, you may put any dirty clothes in here and they will be put back in your room when cleaned." _Shrugging he decided to grab his dirty clothes and put them in the hamper and left the room area.

It wasn't hard to find the eating area, all he had to do was follow his nose. The cafeteria was pretty big, on one side there was pretty decent buffet for both trainers and pokemon it seemed. And across from that was a lot of tables and booths. So he took out his poke-dex and went to where he was supposed to insert the device into the scaner. When he inserted his poke-dex into the slot, a plate and an empty glass popped out of the holes on the table. Shrugging off his surprise he grabbed his poke-dex, once it was released, along with the plate and glass.

Once he had his food he got into a booth, picked up his chopsticks, and was about to eat the shrimp dumplings. Before he could eat the bite the doors leading to the outside in the cafeteria opened. Then a group of familiar people came in. The bite never got to his mouth.

"I'm just saying it's kind of wei-"

"*gasp* Naruto-kun!" The voice of Shikamaru was cut off by the sudden shriek of Ino. She was suddenly at the blondes table slipping in to the seat in front of him. "When did you get here, Naruto-kun?"

"*sigh* Just a few moments ago Ino." The dumpling fell to the plate. Suddenly he didn't feel like eating. "When did you guys get here?" He asked, more so to Shikamaru and the others than to Ino.

"Yesterday, why did it take you so long to get here?" This was Shikamaru that answered.

"I was training my pokemon along the way so I took a lot of breaks." He turned to Shikamaru and noticed the other people behind him. Aside to Choji was Kiba Inuzuka in a red pull over hoodie, a black and yellow ball cap worn backwards on his head. Tan cargo shorts, and red and black tennis shoes. Next to him was Hinata Hyuga, a light blue sleevles shirt and a light red skirt was her clothing. Along with long blue socks that were pushed down slightly and red and white tennis shoes. On the other side of Kiba was boy wearing a long sleave coat, that was a lightish gray, round sun glasses, even though he was inside. A pair of brown shorts and white tennis shoes. This was Shino Aburame, he was kind of weird and always silent, it was kind of creepy whenever he did talk, to Naruto that is.

"Speaking of, where is your pokemon?" Shikamaru looked around for any sighns.

"Oh, well they're being treated, we kinda just got through with a pretty big battle against a flock of Spearow." He scratched the back of his head.

"Whoa whoa, wait, 'they're' as in 'they'?" Kiba asked unsure, "How many do you have like two?"

"No, actually I have four."

"FOUR!" It was a collective shout amongst the group.

"How did that happen? How did you catch four pokemon?" Kiba was still bewildered.

"Uh, with poke-balls, duh." Naruto couldn't resist.

"Gah! You know what I mean."

Naruto laughed a bit, "yeah, yeah cool your jets."

"_Whiskers!" _They all turned to the direction to where they heard a Vulpix yip it's name.

The Vulpix jumped into Naruto's lap getting a 'oof' out of the blonde, and stayed there. Soon a Blissey showed up, pushing a tray with three poke-balls. "Hello to you too Kurama," he turned to the Blissey, "thank you." The Blissey chirped a response and took off once Naruto got all his poke-balls.

"Aww, he's sooo cute, Naruto-kun." Ino cooed as she scratched the Vulpix behind his ear.

_'Oh, I like her, I wonder if this is that Sakura girl, Whiskers keeps mumbling about in his sleep.' _The golden fox thought.

"Uh, thanks Ino." Naruto didn't exactly know what to say.

'_Huh, guess not._' Was the after thought of Kurama.

"What's wrong with his fur." Kiba asked aloud to everyone. The result was a face full of flames. "Ow, what the hell man."

"Uh, yeah, he doesn't like it when people make fun of his fur."

"Aww, you poor thing is Kiba-baka being mean to you." Ino once again cooed as she scratch the Vulpix's favorite spot.

"You made him do that didn't you, Naruto-teme." Kiba accused.

"No I didn't, I told you he doesn't like having his fur talked about or anything."

"Okay that's it, you and me two on two pokemon battle right now." Kiba pointed a finger at Naruto.

"Uh, I'm eating, besides I was planning on challenging the leader."

"Don't bother," Shikamaru started, "we just got back from trying to challenge him, he isn't taking any challangers."

"What?!" Naruot shouted, causing Shikamaru to cover his ears.

"It is true." Shino spoked up for the first time causing Naruto to cringe. "It seems as though he wants to work on his sculpting."

"Yeah," Kiba took over, "something about not having enough inspiration or something. I don't know, all I heard was 'No battle' so that's good enough for me." Kiba folded his arms across his chest. "So we gonna battle or not?"

"Ugh, can you give me like an hour, I kinda wanna eat." Naruto groaned.

"Fine, you have one hour, meet me outside of the pokemon center when the hour is up."

"Yeah, okay."

"Prepare to go down." Kiba laughed.

"Sure, whatever." Naruto rolled his eyes as he finally ate his shrimp dumpling.

"Can I stay and eat lunch with you Naruto-Kun?" Ino spoked up, with a bit of hopefulness in her light blue eyes.

"*sigh* Okay." Naruto didn't like to be rude. Don't get him wrong he liked Ino, she is cute, in her own way, but he just always had eyes for Sakura. Maybe she would be okay if she would take a chance to get to know him, by more than his reputation as the champions son, then maybe. Then again maybe not, his heart, to him, belonged to Sakura, even if she doesn't return his feelings. He still holds hope for that day to come when she will, but until then he would wait and try to accomplish his goals. His guess on Ino, however, would be that she would never change. Still he couldn't just be rude to the blonde hair girl, she is still considered a friend.

"Great I'll go get a plate." She got up and walked over to where she could get a plate and a glass.

"You two wanna join us?" Naruto turned to Shikamaru and Choji as he took a sip of his ice tea. They looked at each other and shook their heads.

"No, she has been talking non stop about going on a date with you. If we stay, she'd never let us hear the end of it." Shikamaru sighed.

"You traitors." Naruto huffed.

"Hey, our dads are making us travel with her, and we don't want her to be even more annoying than she already is. She talks all the time about you." Shikamaru turned about to walk off. "'Sides, I wanna take a nap."

"Bye man, see you around." Choji called as he joined Shikamaru. When they left, is the same time Ino showed up. On her plate was a plain salad with little dressing, another one of her diets.

"So, Naruto-kun, what do you think of my outfit." She put a finger to her pouty lips and stook her chest out a bit.

Naruto was trying so hard to fight back both a blush and a nosebleed. '_This is going to be a long lunch hour._'

_'Hmm, I think Whiskers and this Ino girl are wanting to mate.' _Kurama took in both Ino and Naruto. _'Well more like the girl wants to mate with him poor, poor Whiskers.' _The perverted fox than snickered at his thoughts.

_An hour later.._

As Naruto walked out to the front of the center from his room, he began to wonder which pokemon he whould use against Kiba. He didn't really know what kind of pokemon Kiba has, so he will just have to use his gut. _'I think I'll start with Valor than switch to Kurama.'_

"I thought you were going to chicken out." Kiba called out when he saw Naruto exiting the Pokemon Center.

"You wish." Naruto smirked. He looked around and saw that all his friends were there, except for Sakura, which he was a bit upset about. Sasuke wasn't there either, but he didn't care about that. He stood across from Kiba, "well let's do this, choose your pokemon."

"You first." Kiba countered.

"Fine," he reached fo a poke-ball from his belt, "GO! Valor." He threw the ball forward, it popped open releasing bluish white light that took the form of a small Riolu.

"Whoa, who's that pokemon?" Kiba took out his poke-dex, which looked like Naruot's but was brown instead of orange. When he scanned the pokemon his eyebrows rosed. "Where the hell did you get a Riolu?"

"You going to ask idiotic questions or are you going to battle?" Naruto crossed his arms.

"Fine," Kiba threw a ball, "GO! Cynder." When the blue light took form a Cyndaquil appeared looking around confused.

"Uh, Kiba, have you let your Cyndaquil out since you got it?" Naruto asked taking in the pokemon's confusion.

"No, I haven't had to until now." Kiba answered confused by Naruto's question. "Look forget the questions and just battle."

Valor looked to his trainer. _"Tell me what to do Naruto-sensei."_

"Fine, alright Valor prepare yourself." Valor nodded and got into his stance, his paws glowing slightly.

"_What's going on?" _Cynder looked around confused.

"Cynder, use **Ember **on that Riolu."

"_Alright." _Cynder fired sparks of fire towards Valor.

Valor flung himself to the side dodging the attack. He then performed a **Quick Attack **on Naruto's command. The Cyndaquil tried to escape but he couldn't follow the pokemon's movements. Even though the **Quick Attack **wasn't even fully completed yet, it was still pretty effective when Valor strucked the fire pokemon.

"Cynder, cover the area with **Smoke Screen**." The small fire type let out a huge amount of smoke, covering the whole field.

"Valor!" Naruto called out, "find his aura then use **Force Palm**." Naruto instructed.

"There isn't anything your pokemon can-" Kiba was cut off by the sounds of flesh being smacked repeatedly. Suddenly Cynder was sent rolling out of the smoke, fainted with multiple bruises. "What the? But how did he lose?"

"Simple Kiba," Naruto started as the smoke cleared, "you haven't trained your Cyndaquil since you got it. While I was training Valor ever since I caught him." The smoke was finally cleared showing Valor breathing hard, his eyes and paws both losing their bluish glow. He was still in his fighting stance, prepared for anything. "It's like I always say Kiba, there is no such thing as weak pokemon, only weak trainers." Naruto stated sagely.

"I thought thats what your _dad _always says, Naruto." The blonde face falted after Shikamaru's statement.

Naruto rubbed the back of his head a sheepish grin on his whiskered mark cheeks. "Yeah, well it's a good moto to go by so I say it to."

"This isn't over yet Naruto, Go! Akamaru." Out of the next ball came a Growlithe. This one seemed more sure of himself.

Naruto looked to Valor, even though Cynder was untrained, the use of the unfinished **Quick Attack **that was done as fast as he could. Combined with detecting the pokemon's aura, along with **Force Palm **took a lot out of the small Riolu. "Valor, return." He held up Valor's ball and sent him back in the device. "You did great, take a good rest." He said to the ball before putting it back on his belt. "Let's have a real battle now, Kurama your up." Kurama jumped forward, he growled back at the growling fire dog pokemon.

"Akamaru, use **Ember**." The dog pokemon let lose the attack, the attack hit home, but did nothing to the fire fox. "What the? Why didn't the attack work?"

It was Shikamaru who answered. "Even though the Vulpix is a shiny, it still has _Flash Fire, _meaning that fire-type moves will have no affect on him if anything you made his fire-type moves even more powerful." Everyone looked at Shikamaru bewildered. "What? It's basic common sense."

"Kurama try a **Quick Attack**." Naruto called out.

The fire fox shot off to the dog pokemon, but Akamaru narrowlly escaped the attack. Akamaru then performed a **Tackle **that succesfully hit Kurama. The fox wasn't down for long, he shot up and performed another **Quick Attack** only this time it hit the dog pokemon.

"Good job Kurama, now use **Tackle**." The fox hit the dog pokemon with the attack that Naruto called out. The fire dog then got up and tried another **Tackle **attack, but this time Kurama dodged it. "Now use **Tackle **to get him in the air, then jump and use **Stomp**." Kurama nodded as he got in close and hit the pokemon sending the dog up in the air. He then jump above him and came down on the defenseless fire dog with a hard **Stomp **attack that forced Akamaru down faster. The dog hit the ground with a loud **THUD **with Kurama still on top. Akamaru had swirls in his eyes and was whimpering slightly.

"Good job Kurama." Naruto scratched the pokemon's head after he walked over to him. He looked at Akamaru than at the worried Kiba. "Is he going to be okay?"

Kiba nodded as he pulled out Akamaru's ball. "Yeah, he just needs some rest at the Pokemon Center. Both him and Cynder should be fine."

Naruto nodded his head glad to hear the news. "That's good to hear."

"Wow, Naruto-kun, you were great!" Ino shouted as she glomped the blonde male.

"Uh, thanks, but can you get off me please." He asked with a blush thanks to the close contact with the blonde girl.

"Oopsey, sorry Naruto-kun." She said childly, as she got up.

Naruto got up too dusting off his new outfit, he then glared at Kurama when he heard the fox pokemon laughing. "Well I'm going to head back to the center. Uh, but first where is the gym?"

"Don't bother going there," Shikamaru started, "he isn't in the gym, he's at his art gallery."

"Where is that?" Came the next question Naruto had.

"It's a couple blocks behind the gym, you can't miss it. It's got a huge display on the outside." Shikamaru then put his hands in his pockets, "but don't bother he isn't taking any challenges. We were going to stay here for another day or so to see if he changes his mind."

"Oh, well I'm still going to try, it couldn't hurt to try right?"

"Whatever." With that they all went there separate ways, Naruto decided to wait on the center and hurry to try to ask the leader for a battle.

While him and Kurama were walking they saw two figures coming from the direction that they were heading in. One was a pink haired girl, the other was a black haired boy. It was Sakura and Sasuke, they were headed towards the blonde. "Hey Sakura-chan!" Naruto called, the pink haired girl looked towards Naruto and her face brighten.

"Hey Naruto-sempai." She called back as she hurried to the blonde boy. When she caught up to him she was smiling brightly. "When did you get here?" She asked once she was in front of Naruto.

"Today like a couple of hours ago, you?" He smiled at Sakaura.

"We got in yesterday." She looked to Sasuke who had a scowl on his face as he just walked by both her and Naruto.

"What's wrong with him." Naruto pointed his thumb towards the back of the black haired boy.

"Oh yeah, he's upset 'cause the leader denied him a battle." She said looking at Sasuke's back sadly.

"Oh, well he'll get over it." He looked towards the Uchiha, "honestly though, I don't see what you see in him Sakura-chan." He looked towards Sakura. She blushed under his stare and looked down.

"Oh, who is this?" She said both shocked by the pokemon and wanting to change the subject. She knelt down, "he's so cute." She gushed as she scratched behind Kurama's ear.

_'Oh, so this is who Whiskers is dreaming about.' _Kurama thought when he saw the pink haired girl. _'Oh I like you pinky.' _He thought when she began to scratch behind his ear.

Naruto knelt down with Sakura allowing the change of subject. He began to pet the fire fox, "His name is Kurama, he's my starter."

"Oh." Sakura looked to Naruto, she then felt a hand on hers, she looked down to see Naruto slightly holding her hand. When she looked up she saw worry and concern in his eyes, and sadness, but for what? The stare did make her blush a bit and turn her eyes away.

"Sakura-chan," Naruto was trying to figure out how to say what he wants to. "I-I*sigh* just, be safe, and whatever happens I'll be there for you." Sakura blushed again.

"Thanks Naruto-kun." She whispered, but blushed again slightly when she added the 'kun'. She then stood up. "I should get going." Naruto let go of her hand before she stood up, Naruto stood too. "Bye, I'll see ya later." She tried to hide the blush on her face, as she took off for the Pokemon Center.

Naruto had a sad look on his face as he watched the pink haired girl walk away. "I love you Sakura-chan." He whispered to himself saying what he wanted to say to Sakura.

Kurama looked up to Naruto. _'Why didn't he tell her that?' _The fox wondered as he looked at his trainer sadly.

"Let's go Kurama." Naruto said with a slightly sad look on his face and a pain in his gut. He began to walk towards the art gallery again.

_The Art Gallery.._

"Shikamaru was right, you _can't _miss it." Naruto said noticing the very big and tall building. The huge display was just a couple of blown up pictures of statues that were carved to look like pokemon. He made his way inside the building, his mouth was open in awe at the look of the place. There were numerous of masterly carved statues of pokemon. He was looking around trying to take it all in.

"Can I help you?" He turned his head toward the female voice. It was a woman in her late twenties, wearing a white blouse under a small tan suit jacket, and a brown suit skirt. She had a clip board in one hand a pen in the other, her ash blonde hair was up in a tight bun. "This gallery is closed young man, come back in a week maybe we'll be open."

Naruto shook his head to get his thoughts straighten out. "No wait, I'm not here for the gallery, I was told the gym leader would be here."

"Oh, another trainer come to bother Deidara-sama? Sorry but like he told the others he is not taking any challenges right now, so scoot." She tried to get Naruto to leave but neither he nor Kurama were budging.

"Listen lady, I'm not leaving until I talk to the gym leader." Naruto said standing his ground.

"Fine, and my name isn't 'Lady' it's Miko." She pointed to the name tag on her right brest pocket.

"Great, thanks Miko-san." Naruto smiled as Miko led the way to where the gym leader, Dedara, was. "Don't take too long, I hope you can find your way out when he tells you 'No'." Naruto huffed but nodded.

He entered the door they stopped at looking around, Kurama doing the same thing. It was a huge room with multiple statues that were either not finished, cracked, or just completely destroyed. "No, no it's still not right." He heard a voice. He looked towards the center of the room. He saw a tall blonde man with his long blonde hair in a high pony tail, about in his late teens or early twenties. Blue almost grey eyes. He could only see one 'cause the man had one side of his face covered by hair. He had a black shirt on under a black zipper hoodie, and blue jean shorts. Sandles are what he wore on his feet, he was sitting on a small stool, glaring at the unfinished stone statue. He got rid of it and brought a new block of marble. He then noticed Naruto was there, he pointed the chisle at the younger blonde, "you! Who are you?" He got up and made his way towards Naruto. "Well?" He stopped in front of the younger blonde.

"Uh," he shook his head to get rid of his shock. "I'm Naruto Namikaze, a pokemon trainer."

"Namikaze? Are you by chance related to the champion?" He asked after thinking over the blondes name for a while.

"Yeah, he's my father." Naruto said feeling rather small, like he usually does when people talk about his father.

"Oh cool, well before you ask, no I'm far too busy for a battle right now." He went to walk away.

"Busy with what?" Naruto asked as the man walked away.

He stopped, "art. I'm busy trying to create a masterpiece."

"Well, do you need any help?" Naruto asked trying anything to get a battle.

"Help? Can you sculpt, or do you even know anything about art?" Deidara asked examining the blonde.

"No."

"Then go away." He made a shooing motion with his hand.

"Wait, isn't there anything I can do to help?" Deidara stopped and turned around to face the young trainer.

"Hmm." He was studying both Naruto and Kurama. "Is that Vulpix the only pokemon you have?"

"No, I have four including him." Naruto held up four fingers while motioning to Kurama.

"Bring them out, let's see them." Deidara went over to the new piece of marble that he had placed in front of the stool.

Naruto let out the rest of his team, when they were all out they all looked around the room marveling at all the unfinished or damaged statues. "Here they are."

"Wow, two shinies, a small Riolu and an Oshawatt, not a bad team kid." Deidara was studying both pokemon and trainer now.

"Uh, thanks, I think."

"Now stand over there with your pokemon." He pointed to a spotlighted area that Naruto didn't notice before.

"Okay, but what's-"

"If you want a battle stand over there." Deidara said impatiently.

Naruto complied he got in the spot light his pokemon with him. "Like this?"

"Yeah." Deidara nodded, but got up after studying him a little bit. He walked over to the blonde and his pokemon, he grabbed Naruto's left hand and put it in the air parralleled to the ground. "Now point." Naruto complied pointing off to the left. Deidara then turned the younger blondes head to face where he was pointing. He then turned Naruto's body to the right, "spread your feet." Again Naruto listened and spread his feet.

Naruto now stood with the front of his body facing where Deidara was sitting moments ago. His feet pointed to the block of marble, with his left arm up. He was pointing to the left and his head was turned to where his finger was pointing. He was looking off into the distance. Deidara took a step back and studied the blonde, he then looked to the young trianers pokemon. He pointed to Kurama, "you, stand right there." He pointed to the left side of Naruto, Kurama looked to Naruto who nodded. The fox pokemon listened to the tall blonde, "now turn and face where your trainers pointing." Kurama turned and faced where Naruto was ponting. Deidara knelt down and lifted the shinies head up a bit, pushed his tails down. "Stand proudly."

He then turned to Valor, "stand here and act like your looking for something, but don't move." Valor listend and stood on the right of Kurama and slightly behind him, he had his left paw above his eyes looking into the distance. "Kneel down." The small Riolu listend and knelt down on his left knee. His right arm on his right knee. "Perfect, now don't move, now you," he pointed to Neptune, "stand like your trainer." Neptune listened, he was pointing and looking off into the distance standing directly behind Valor but directly in front of Naruto. He had his right hand on his hips, trying to stand as proudly as he could. "Now you," he looked to Puka, "I want you to get on your trainer's shuolder." Puka complied and crawled up to Naruto's right shoulder. "Now lean forward and look to the left." She did so, Deidara took a few steps back, "perfect."

"Uh, whats this for?" Naruto asked trying not to look away from where he was pointing.

"Be my model and maybe I'll give you a battle."

"Really?" Naruto turned his head.

"Stay still!" Deidara yelled, Naruto turned his head back to where he was pointing. "I said 'maybe' and thats if you _stay still_." Naruto remained still only his chest was moving due to his breathing.

_'I'll take it, it's better than a 'no'.' _Naruto thought trying not to move, his pokemon doing the same thing.

Deidara walked back over to his stool, and got a sketch pad and a sketching pencil. "I'm going to sketch you first than I'll try sculpting." He kept glancing to the blond while drawing on the sketch pad, "this could be my best work." He mumbled to himself.

_An Hour Later.._

Naruto and his pokemon were starting to get tired, his arm was trembling. He glanced to the older blond who had just put away his pad. "Okay, you can move now." Naruto and his pokemon relaxed. Deidara walked over to the door that Naruto and Kurama came in from. "Now leave." He motioned to the open door.

**BOOM**

The loud explosion was heard by both Naruto and Dedara, "what was that?" Naruto asked walking to the open door to figure out the answer.

"I don't know." He satrted to exit but turned back to Naruto, "stay here." He left to go check out the disturbance.

"Tch, yeah right, lets go guys." Naruto and his team followed after the gym leader, also heading towards the disturbance. When he caught up he saw two people, a male and a female. The male looked to be in his early twenties. Black beady eyes, with black gravity defying spiky hair. Wearing a gray long sleeve shirt over a black shirt that was tucked into gray pants. The shirts sleeves were stuffed into black leather gloves that extended up to a few inches below his elbows. His gray pants were tucked into black leather boots that went up to below his knees. On the front of his shirt was a musical note.

The female had long black hair that extended to the middle of her back, and coal black eyes. She seemed to be in her early twenties as well. She wore a similar outfit to the male, only her black shirt and gray long sleeve shirt showed off her toned belly. The black leather gloves she wore covered her entire arm, stopping just below the shoulders. Instead of gray pants she had a tight gray miniskirt, and her leather boots covered her legs stopping only about two inches below her skirt. She too had a musical note on her chest, only it was slightly bulging out due to her breasts.

"Who are you?" Deidara demanding from the two.

"Who are we?" The male questioned.

"We're part of the great and mighty group, Team Sound." The Female said.

The male gestured to himself, "I'm Zaku," he motioned to the female, "and she's Kin."

"Uh, never heard of ya." Naruto said catching the attention of Dedara and Team Sound.

"I told you to stay put." Deidara glared at Naruto.

"Okay, but do you have your pokemon?" The gym leaders face went white along with his eyes. "Thought so." Naruto stepped forward facing the male and female, now known as Zaku and Kin. "Hey Team Note-"

"It's Team _Sound_!" Zaku and Kin shouted simultaneously.

"Whatever," Naruto crossed his arms. "Anyway what are you doing here."

"Glad you asked little boy." Naruto frowned at Kin's statement, she laughed. "We're here to take all this priceless art."

"What?!" Deidara shouted.

"We're going to take all this art and give it to our boss." Zaku answered, smirking dvelishly.

Naruto stepped forward, "no your not." He stood confidently.

Team Sound began to laugh hysterically at the blonde teen. "Who's going to stop us? You, little boy?"

"Yeah, me and my pokemon." Naruto glared at the two Team Sound members. "Puka, Kurama, let's go." The two shinies stepped forward.

"_Let's take these idiots down._" Kurama looked to Puka.

"_Let's do it, Kurama-kun." _Sparks came off Puka's cheeks.

Zaku began to laugh, "check it out Kin, his pets want to fight us." Zaku had a cocky grin on his features.

"Let's show them some real pokemon." After Kin's statement they each took out a poke-ball.

"Go! Venom." Out of the poke-ball Zaku threw came a Gligar. It soared for a bit before landing infront of its trainer.

"Go! Mamba." Kin's Pokemon of choice was a Seviper, the snake pokemon began to glare at the smaller pokemon.

"Venom, use **Aerial Ace**." The Gligar went for the Pikachu colored Pichu with it's wings glowing.

"Puka dodge it!" Naruto yelled but he knew his pokemon wouldn't be able to get out of the way in time.

"_No you don't._" Kurama called as he hit the Gligar with glowing tails, that turned to metal for a split second when it hit the Gligar.

_'Did he just use **Iron Tail**?' _Naruto thought when he saw the attack hit.

"Mamba **Poison Tail**." The Seviper's tail glowed purple as it sent the attack toward Kurama.

"Quick use **Quick Attack **to dodge." Kurama obeyed but took it a step further. He used the attack to get around the Seviper and attack it when it was confused on it's miss. The snake pokemon was sent back to it's trainer knocking Kin down with Mamba on top of her. "Good job Kurama."

"Ah, Mamba get off me!" Kin shouted to the dazed pokemon.

"Venom use **Poison Fang **on that annoying Vulpix." The Gligar listened to its trainer as it glided towards Kurama.

"Puka, use **Thunder Bolt**." Puka's cheeks sparked for a bit then shot a large amount of electricity towards the bat like pokemon. Gligar, who was too focus on getting its revenge on Kurama, didn't see the electricity coming right for it until it was too late. Venom let out a shriek as it was electrified, he was then sent back towards his trainer. Venom hit Zaku with enough force to send him to the ground.

"Venom get the hell off of me!" Now both Team Sound members were knocked down with dazed pokemon preventing them from getting up. Ironicly enough they never thought to just send the pokemon back to their respective poke-balls.

"Alright Kurama finish it, use **Ember**." The golden Vulpix prepared to send out sparks of fire. However, due to his anger towards the pokemon that tried to attack his friend, he put more force behind the attack. So without thinking about it, a stream of very hot fire shot out towards Team Sound and their pokemon. When it hit it sent the criminals and their pokemon flying out of the giant hole they made in the wall.

While flying through the air Zaku began to think out loud, "Ugh, the boss isn't going to be happy when we tell him that we failed."

Kin crinched as she thought of their sadistic boss, "well, I sure as hell am not going to tell him."

"What? I ain't telling him either." The two kept bickering as they flew off with their pokemon.

Deidara stared at the blonde and his pokemon in shock. "You just saved all of my art from being stolen." The gym leader was ecstatic by the blondes heroics.

"Uh, yeah, say uhm sorry about the wall though." Naruto rubbed the back of his head as he looked at the large hole in the wall.

"Pfft." Deidara waved it off, "that can be fixed, but my art is irreplaceable." Deidara approached the young trainer. "If there is anything I can do for you just name it."

Naruto grined as a thought came into his head, "well, you could give me that battle I want."

Deidara chuckled, "you got it."

"Yes!" Naruto cheered, as did his pokemon.

"Calm down, calm down," Deidara made a motion with his hands, "we'll battle tomorrow, at one thirty."

Naruto nodded, "great." Naruto returned his pokemon, "let's go Kurama. Bye, thanks again Deidara-san." Naruto waved as he ran off towards the exit.

Deidara chuckled, _'such a unique trainer.' _He than looked from the hole in the wall to the room he and the young trainer were in. _'I think I just got some great insperation.' _He took off towards where the block of marble was, _'this will truly be my greatest work of art. Yeah.' _He nodded to himself as he entered the room to begin on his new project.

_The Pokemon Center.._

Naruto entered the Pokemon center with a grin on his face and Kurama on his shoulder. He ran up to the front desk. "Oh, welcome back, how may I help you?" The Pokemon Nurse asked seeing Naruto aproach the desk.

"Yeah, can you heal my pokemon I want to do some trainer before it gets too late." Kurama hopped onto the front desk, less nervous than he was the first time around. Naruot then put three poke-balls on the desk.

"I'll be glad to, I just need to see your poke-dex." Naruto nodded and handed the device over to the nurse. She inserted Dexter into a machine, once again Naruto's image and info. appeared on the screen on the wall. "Thank you, Namikaze-sama." She bowed as she handed the device back to him, Naruto frowned slightly, but it left his features quickly. "It will be about an hour."

"Thank you, and take your time." He looked to Kurama, "behave, I'll see you soon buddy." Naruto scratched Kurama behind his ear. The nurses assistant, Blissey, wheeled Kurama and the three poke-balls to the back for treatment. Naruto went over to where the video phones were, _'I almost forgot to let mom know that I got her package.' _Naruto sat down at one of the video phones and dialed his mom's number. Soon his mom's image came onto the screen.

"_Naruto Namikaze, why the hell didn't you call me sooner! Do you know how worried I was when I heard from the _delivery man _and not _you _that you got my package?!" _Kushina yelled nearly blowing out Naruto's ear drum, when she saw who was calling her. Naruto had to hold the phone away from his ear when she shouted

"Mom, I'm sorry, I got distracted with all that's happened that it slipped my mind." Naruto answered meekly.

Kushina sighed, "_okay, but don't let it happen again or I will come for you and show you why I was nicknamed the 'Red-hot coordinator'._" Her threat did not go on deaf eaars, for Naruto turned ghost white when he heard that, he knew of all the stories.

"O-okay, mom, I promise I won't ever forget again to call you."

"_Okay,_" she than took upon a sweet look on her face. "_So how are things going now?_" Naruot smiled as he began to tell his mom of everything that happened ever since he got to Boulder City.

_About thirty minutes later.._

Naruto was sitting on a couch in the Pokemon Center, reading the guide he had bought earlier that day. He was looking at the information it had on Dedara, _'so he uses three pokemon that can use either __**Explosion**__, or __**Self-Destruct**__.' _Naruto sighed laying back into the couch looking up to the ceiling. _'I suppose I could try teaching my pokemon __**Dig **__to try and evade the attack.' _He than thought of who he should use. _'I know I'm going to use Kurama, but I think I should save him for last. Who to choose though?' _He knew of pokemon that can use one or both of the attacks. _'I know of some, but there are just too many possiblities.' _He looked back to the guide, _'this guide is seeming like a waste of money, either it's this vague so it won't be considered cheating, or the author is just a total douche-bag.' _

Naruto looked at the authors name for the first time. His eyes widened when he saw the name, "Pokemon Master Jiraiya?" Naruto was shocked, he's the one that took his father under his wing for a while. He was also one of the three that challenged and had almost beaten Proffesor Sarutobi when he was champion. Their battles were so intense and so amzaing, that him and the other two were giving the title of Pokemon Master. It was a step below champion but they were considered to be on a whole nother level. Since then they each went their separate ways. Jiraiya, after a few years, took Naruto's dad under his wing. It's Naruto's belief that it was because of this training that his father was able to become champion. He was also Naruto's hero, aside to his dad, he would give anything to train his pokemon under the masters tutelage, even for an hour.

"Naruto-sempai?" Naruto turned away from the book to see Sakura.

"Hey Sak-"

"Naruto-kun!" He was interupted by a shriek and a blond blur next thing he knew he had something soft against his chest and in a tight embrace. His face was turning red, both from the feeling on his chest and the lack of air.

"Ino. Choking. Not breathing." Naruto barely got out. Ino giggled as she let go, but she was still straddling Naruto's lap.

"Sorry Naruto-kun." She smiled sweetly.

Sakura, however, was glaring at the blonde female. _'What does she think she is doing? Why is she sitting on _my _Naruto-' _Her eyes widened when she relized what she thought. _'Wait, why did I say that, I mean think that.' _She was blushing furriously at her thoughts.

"Say uh, Ino, can you get off of me?" Naruto said trying to fight back the nosebleed and the blush on his face. She giggled and got off of Naruto, who crossed his legs trying to hide his _problem_ caused by the blonde girl. She sat next to him, as his other friends, including Sasuke, came over.

"Say, Naruto-kun, how did it go with the gym leader, you were gone for a long time." Ino asked curiously.

"Oh well it's kind of a long story." Naruto rubbed the back of his head while sheepishly grinning.

"Well let us hear it man." Shikamaru said sitting on the floor getting comfortable, Chouji joined him. Sasuke got in close to hear while Kiba got in closer. Sakura sat on the otherside of Naruto on the couch, sitting close to her male blonde friend. Ino glared at the pink haired girl and Sakura glared back. Naruto looking between the two had no idea what was going on between them, or why they were glaring.

"Okay, well let's see where to start?" He then began to tell his friends about the events starting with when he entered the gallery.

_Another Thirty minutes later.._

"YOU GOT A GYM BATTLE?!" Sasuke uncharacteristically shouted. Shocking everyone in the area.

"Yeah." Naruto answered as he was stroking Kurama who was laying peacefully curled up in his lap. Kurama and his other pokemon were returned to him when he was almost done telling his friends of his tale. "Yeah, it was because I stopped the idiots of Team Sound from taking his art." Naruto explained, he was about to explain that part when he was interupted by Sasuke. "Dedara-san was so happy that he said we can battle tomorrow at one thirty."

"Wow, can I come and watch Naruto-kun?" Ino asked trying out the puppy dog look.

Naruto smiled, "sure you all can come to cheer me on if you want." Everyone agreed to go to the gym tomorrow to see their friend's battle. Naruto got up causing Kurama to have to jump down, "welll I'm going to go train my pokemon for a bit then head to bed." He looked at Kurama, "we'll also be doing some training tomorrow."

Naruto waved to his friends, "see you all tomorrow."

"Bye Naruto-sempai/-kun." Sakura and Ino said together getting Ino to glare at Sakura, which caused Sakura to glare back. Naruto was unaware of a tall man with long white spikey hair following him to his training area of choice.

When Naruto got to the area, Kuramas ears pricked up, he lept from his perch on Naruto's shoulder. He landed behind Naruto which caused the blonde to turn around, the golden Vulpix than beagn to growl at a figure. "Who's there? Show yourself." A tall man with long white spikey hair came walking out. He was wearing a white button up shirt tucked into blue dress pants. The long sleeve shirt's sleeves were rolled up to the man's elbows. On his feet were black loafers, on his face were two red lines one on each side of his face. Each starting from underneath the eye going down to his jawline. He had a smirk on his face and wisdom in his eyes.

"Calm down kid, I was just interested in seeing who you were." He had his hands up in a surrendering fashion. "I over heard the nurse say that your name was Namikaze."

"Maybe," Naruto was catious, one of his hands instinctively going to one of his poke-balls. Kurama never moved, he was waiting for a command from his trainer on wether to engage or not. "Depends on who is asking."

The man laughed heartedly, his hands falling to his sides as one slapped his right knee. "Oh man, you remind me so much of your father when we first met." He controled his laughing, "He didn't recongnize me at first either." The man then pointed to the book Naruto still had in his hand, "I wrote that book when he traveled with me." Naruto got a shock look on his face as realization sunk in, "of course it's not a best seller like my 'Poke Girl Paradise'." The man then got a perverted smile on his face.

"Y-Your, J-Jiraiya, Pokemon Master Jiraiya." Naruto finally found his voice, "oh, I have been wanting to meet you for so long. Please can you help me train my pokemon, please, please." Naruto was, well basicly geeking out, he was finally getting to meet one of his idols.

"Why do you want me to help you?" He than folded his arms across his chest. "And why, _should _I help you?"

"You helped my dad, and if it wasn't for you he wouldn't have become champion, please I would give anything to have you help me." Naruto held his hands together in a begging motion.

"Anything?" He then looked to the golden Vulpix. "How 'bout you give me that shiny Vulpix there."

Naruto looked to Kurama, than back to Jiraiya, he then got an angry look on his face. "Hell no, when I said anything I wasn't including my pokemon."

"Why not? I said I would train you if you gave me your Vulpix, how about a trade then?" Jiraiya asked.

"No way, no trades either, if that's what it takes to get you to train me, then forget." Naruto stood proudly.

"Why?" Jiraiya prodded.

"Because, my pokemon are my friends, and I never abandon my friends." He looked to Kurama then glanced to the balls on his belt. "I'll find my own way of getting stronger, just you wait, one day I will be the new pokemon champion of Elena."

Jiraiya than began to laugh boisterously, before Naruto could comment, the older man beat him to it. "Oh, you deffinently are Minato's kid." He looked down to Naruto, _'I have a feeling that with the proper guidance, you would become a great champion.' _He patted Naruto on the head, "Okay kid, I'll help you train your pokemon."

"Really?" Naruto's face lit up when Jiraiya nodded. "Yes!" Naruto began to jump and cheer.

"Now hold on there kid, you still got a gym battle tommorow, so don't celebrate just yet.." Naruot calmed down and nodded his head, "okay let your pokemon out and lets get started."

_The next day at one thirty.._

Naruto was nervous, he was standing on the challanger side of the battlefield, Kurama standing by his feet. He was waiting for the gym leader to show, he looked up to the upper level where his friends stood by the railing. They were shouting out words of encouragement. He then looked under the upper level out of the sight of the spectators. He saw Jiraiya leaning against the wall, he gave the blonde a thumbs up. Then Naruto's eyes darted to the doors, on the side across from him, when he heard them open. The Boulder City gym leader, Deidara, came in he was still in his clothes that he had on yesterday. They seemed to be a bit wrinkled.

"Sorry I'm late, I stayed up half the night, I kinda slept in," he yawned, "I only got up an hour ago." Naruto and just about everybody else sweatdropped.

Naruto held up a poke-ball in his right hand, he extended it out towards Deidara, "gym leader Deidara, I challenge you to a gym battle for your gym badge."

"I accept, this will be a three on three battle." Deidara looked to the referee, who had a red flag in his right hand and a green flag in his left. He was standing to the left of Dedara, to Naruto's right.

"Challanger, chose your first pokemon." The referee called out, Naruto nodded and threw up the ball he had in his hand.

"Your up, Valor." The small Riolu stood proudly in his fighting stance.

"Come on out Rodin." Out of the ball came a pokemon that Naruto hasn't seen before. It looked like it was jaggedly carved from stoned. Dark blue on the outside, in the middle the rock seemed to be carved inward, the color was yellow. Yellowish stone feet and a long piece of stone on its head that was the same yellow color. Naruto brought out his pokedex and scaned the rock creature.

_Bing!_

_Roggenrola-the mantle pokemon-Its ear is hexagonal in shape. Compressed underground, its body is as hard as steel._

"Cool," Naruot said to himself, "You ready Valor?" Valor nodded and got ready for any attack.

"Rodin, use **Rock Blast**." A series of glowing rocks came out of the ground and were flung at Valor.

"Quick use **Double Team**," as the rocks were about to hit mutiple copies of Valor appeard. When the attack hit it kicked up a lot of dust, obscuring the Riolu from vision.

"_Take this Teme!" _The Roggenrola was shocked when Valor came towards him, his front paws were glowing blue. Valor hit the rock pokemon and sent him flying into the air. He lept up and kicked the pokeomn back down to the ground. The gym leaders pokemon hit the ground so hard it left a crater. Valor landed next the whole standing triumphantly.

"Use **Rock Throw**." Valor was too shock to dodge the rocks that were sent flying towards him. He was sent flying across the field skidding to a stop.

"Come on get up Valor you can do it." Naruto called, as he watched Valor get up he sighed. _'I think only one move can even hope to do any damage to that pokemon's defense.' _Naruto sighed defeatedly, "Valor, use it." Valor looked to Naruto as if to see if he meant it, to which the blonde nodded.

"_Okay if you think I can do it Naruto-sensei than I can do it." _The pokemon whispered to himself. He put his hands behind him, a paw over the other. When the aura sparked it started to form a ball. Valor began to run towards the rock pokemon. As he did the ball grew in size, thus causing everyone to gasp in shock. _"Eat this Teme." _Valor thrusted his hands forward, with the average size **Aura Sphere **being shoved into the rock pokemon's hexagonal face. The force was enough to cause Rodin to cry out in pain the pokemon was sent flying towards the wall.

The rock pokemon was embeded into the wall, while Valor was breathing hard. Suddenly, and to Valors shock, Rodin came out of the wall heading straight for Valor. He did notice a slight crack in the pokemon which means that it did some damage. But as Roggenrola was getting closer the pokemon's body was glowing slightly.

"Do it Rodin." Deidara called out.

"Oh no," Naruto relized what was going on, "Valor get out of there! It's going to use **Explosion**!" Naruto called out.

Valor tried to get away but his earlier attack left him very drained of energy. _'Forgive me Naruto-siensei.'_

**BOOM**

When the dust cleared both Rodin and valor were out cold. The referee put his arms over his chest making an X. "Both pokemon are unable to battle."

"Valor!" Naruto called as he ran to the pokemon. He knelt down with Kurama sniffing the small Riolu. Valor opened his eyes for a second to look in his trainers eyes but he didn't see dissapointment in them, but concern and proudness instead. He then passed out. "You'll be okay buddy," he held up Valor's ball, "You deserve a good rest." Valor went back in the ball with a smile on his face. Naruto walked back to his side of the field.

"Are you going to be okay kid?" The gym leader asked.

Naruto nodded, "yeah, let's go!"

"Challanger choose your next pokemon." Naruto threw another ball in the air.

"Let's go, Neptune!" Oshawott came out and got ready, by taking hold of the shell on his belly.

"Da Vinci, your up." When the ball popped open a Pineco appeared, it shook a bit beofre glaring at Neptune. Neptune glared right back at Da Vinci.

_'Pineco, that one will probably use **Explosion **too, Neptune should focus on long distance attacks.' _Naruto looked to Neptune, "Neptune try to stay away as much as possible." The water pokemon nodded.

"_As you wish, Naruto-sama." _Neptune whispered as he prepared himself for anything.

"Da Vinci, **Rapid Spin**." The Pineco began to spin rapidly heading straight towards Neptune.

"Use **Protect**." Neptune held up his shell and a greenish force field appeard around him. The deffense was enough to stop the attack.

"Nice move kid." Deidara smirked, "but what about this, **Bug Bite**." When Neptune's shield was down the bug pokemon used the attack which caused Neptune to cry out.

"Neptune blow him back with **Water Gun**." Neptune nodded ignoring the pain, he gathered water in his mouth then uleashed it at the close pokemon. Da Vinci was sent back but only about fifteen feet from Neptune.

"**Rapid Spin** now." The bug pokemon listened and began to spin rapidly towards Neptune.

"Quick counter with **Aqua Jet**." Neptune flew off towards the spining Pineco, water swirling rapidly around the Oshawott. The two attacks cancled each other out, but manage to kick up some dust. Neptune couldn't see anything while he was looking around for his opponent.

"**Bug Bite**." The Oshawott heard the command, but he couldn't see where either his trainer or the oppenents trainer was. Suddenly he felt a pain in his shoulder, he saw Da Vinci latched onto him. "**Self-Destruct**." Neptunes eyes widened when he heared the chose of attack, the Pineco started to glow.

**BOOM**

It was a while before the dust cleared finally, "Both pokemon are unable to battle." The referee called out crossing his arms into another X.

"Neptune!" Once again Naruto and Kurama ran out to the field, Neptune was fine, but he really needed a rest. "Good job buddy, you deserve a long rest."

"Let's go kid." Deidara said cleaning out his ear, the last explosion was pretty loud due to Da Vinci being closer to him.

"Right." Naruto went back to his side of the field.

"Challanger choose your next pokemon." The referee called.

"Okay," he looked to Kurama, "you ready to win this?" Kurama yipped and jumped foraward ready for anything.

"Oh so I get to see for myself what this Vulpix can do." Deidara smirked, he threw out his last pokeball, "Van Gogh, let's finish this." Out of the ball came an Exeggutor, it shook slightly causing the leaves on it's head to shift.

Naruto couldn't help but smirk, but it went away as he thought. _'Hold on, it's the only one he has tats evolved, that can only mean that this one is his strongest. Oh man I hope we can handle this.' _Naruto shook his head he couldn't doubt himself or his pokemon. _'We can do this Kurama.' _It almost seem like the pokemon heard his thoughts, due to the shiny turning his head towards Naruto and nodded.

"Alright, use **Flamethrower**." A huge stream of fire came out of Kurama's mouth shooting for the grass type.

"**Energy Ball**." Deidara called. The attack got in the way of the **Flamethrower **which caused them to cancel each other out. "Now use **Egg Bomb**." Multiple eggs were being flung at the golden Vulpix.

"Kurama, use **Quick Attack**." Kurama ran out of the way of the exploding eggs at a fast rate, he came up behind the Exeggutor and sent it forward. Kurama then gathered fire in his mouth and breathed out another **Flamethrower **at Naruto's command. This time the attack hit home, Van Gogh cried out due to his weakness to fire. After the attack the grass type got back up, but with some diffuculty, it was still shocking to Kurama.

"Now use **Psychic**." Deidara comanded, Van Gogh's eyes glowed white as Kurama was lifted and flung to the far side hitting the wall underneath the spectators. He was embedded into the wall from the force.

"Kurama!" Kurama came out, slightly dazed, but shook it off. "Let's do it buddy finish it with **Iron Tail**." Kurama ran towards the Exeggutor, his tails glowing before they all turned to metal the attack sent Van Gogh down into the ground creating another crater in the field. Kurama was slightly winded from the attack but otherwise fine. But he was shocked when he saw the grass pokemon get back up, although with difficulty.

"Hey Naruto, when this battle ends in a draw, you don't get the badge." Naruto's eyes widened when he heard that he knew what was going to happen.

"Kurama get out of there!" Naruto yelled as Deidara called out his final attack.

"**Explosion**." Each of Van Gogh's heads glowed one by one.

"_Shit._" Kurama cussed, tyring to think quickly, he thought back to his training with the white haired man and his trainer, an idea strucked him.

**BOOM**

There was so much dust from the attack that no one could tell what happened. The dust was starting to clear to where everyone could see a passed out Van Gogh. "Hn, it's over. Call it ref." Deidara said to the referee.

Suddenly the ground in front of Naruto began to crack. Deidara's eyes widened. Every jaw in the building dropped and hit the floor. Jiraiya had a smirk on his face. But Naruto was the most shocked of all. Shooting out from the ground was Kurama, he was breathing hard and his tails were slightly singed. Otherwise the quick thinking shiny was fine.

"Van Gogh is unable to battle." The referee held up the green flag towards Naruto and Kurama. "The winner of the gym battle is Naruto Namikaze from Leaf Town."

The ones watching cheered for Naruto's win, Sasuke had a scowl on his face as he made his way out of the gym. Naruto and Kurama were jumping with joy, both were excited for their first gym battle win. Even though it was close and by sheer luck, it was still a win.

Deidara made his way towards Naruto. "Well, congradulations, Naruto Namikaze, on behalf of the Boulder City gym, I present to you the Clay Badge." The small metal object Naruto was handed was round, with two bumps on top looking like small round ears. Two small leg like pieces sticking out of the bottom. It was all white in color, with two small black circles making eyes, and four small black squares making an almost smiling mouth.

Naruto held up the badge high the object shining slightly in the light. "Yeah, I got the Clay Badge." Naruto cheered, Kurama jumping and cheering with his trainer. Suddenly all of Naruto's friends were surronding the blond all commenting on how awesome the battle was. Sakura and Ino each gave Kurama an Oran Berry, and either stroked or scratched the golden Vulpix.

"Wait, wait," Deidara called getting everyone to calm down, "Naruto I got something else I want to show you."

"What is it?" Naruto cocked his head slightly wondering what the gym leader had in mind.

"Come with me to the gallery, you all can come." He then led the way to the gallery, Naruto and his friends followed.

When they got to the gallery, and to the display of Deidara's newest sculptor Kiba started to snicker. Sakura and Ino were both wide eyed, along with the rest of Naruto's friends. Jiraiya, who followed them, smircked when he saw the statue. Naruto, however, was embarassed as was made obvious by the blush on his face. The statue was an exact match to the pose that he and his pokemon were in when Deidara sketched them. He didn't know that Deidara was going to do _this_. Although it was cool, and expertly made with not a single imperfection.

"Future Elena Champion?" Naruto read the inscription on the golden plaque, that was attached to the base of the statue.

"Yep," Deidara smiled, "suits it right?"

Naruto's embarrassment went away, he smiled determinedly as he nodded. "It's perfect." He began to laugh in excitement for his journey ahead, his friends, Deidara, and Jiraiya joined in.

**Hello it's me Kushina, Naruto's mom. Next time my little boy is offered more help with his training from Jiraiya. Also Naruto is challenged to a battle by Sasuke. So next time parts of the training is covered, and it seems that my little baby catches a new pokemon. How will the training go? Will Naruto be able to defeat Sasuke? What pokemon will Naruto catch? Guess we better check back next time in Chapter 4 The Pervert's Training. That pervert better not corrupt my little baby.**

**(A/N: Sorry it took me so long, a lot is happening in my life that I really don't want to get into. I am sorry to say this, but until I get chapter four outlined, and atleast started on chapter five, I won't be updating for a while. But don't worry, no matter how long I am away I will update this story, I love it too much to abadon it. Also if you could, I would like some ideas for the training in the next chapter, to kinda help me out, what would you like to see done? Tell me and maybe I'll use it. I will try to give you credit if I do. I also have been bombarded with multiple story ideas for other stories. Sorry about that false update, I don't know what I was thinking, but thanks to a guest review I rethought the Team Sound idea. The update was just an AN which I'm not proud of. Anyway thank you to the one that sumbmitted the review I did rethink the idea of Team Sound and I think it will make my story better than I thought. Also, another guest review suggested the Roggenrola for Dedara, thank you for that idea. The name 'Rodin' is the last name of a sculptor, he's the one that did the 'Thinker' also you noticed that Dedara's pokemon were named after artsy people, yeah. Also I have a poll going on a side project that I will do when I'm not doing this story. The poll is on which Naruto based story should be done, and each one has a different pairing to it. The details of the story are on my profile, and you can find the poll there too, I suggest you read the details first. Also, if your having a hard time picturing the Clay Badge, I have a link to my Deviant Art account on my profile that shows a colored drawing of each of the Elena gym badges. Now don't critisize my drawing, I did them all free handed. Also incase you haven't geussed it, yes each of the eight gym leaders is one of the Akatsuki. When you see the badges you can pretty much guess who Naruto will fight. Now I have never seen this done in some of the Pokemon/Naruto fanfics, I think it is pretty cool. Now don't worry, Kakashi, Gai, and two other leaf Jonin, I won't say who, will be in the Fic just not until later on. Now if anyone has an idea for a Pokemon, for either Naruto, Sakura, the gym leaders, Kakashi, Gai, or just random pokemon for someone to have, send me a PM. Be sure to include a nickname as well, if not then I will think of one myself. A big thank you to The Keeper of Worlds, he has giving me some ideas to make the small romance side to this story better. Another thing is ideas for side stories, just random towns with some situation that Naruto and company get mixed up with, it can be based off a filler from Naruto or Pokemon, or just something you would like to see done. I will do my best to either make a chapter out of it or add it to a future chapter to fill in space. I will really appreciate any and all help with either the pokemon or side story idea. No I don't really need them, but I'm a people pleaser. Thanky you, ttfn ta ta for now.)**


	4. Chapter 4 The Pevert's Training

**Chapter 4**

**The Pervert's Training**

***Disclamor: The following is a non-profit fan based story.  
****Naruto is the property of Masashi Kishismoto and TV tokyo.  
****Pokemon is the property of Nitendo, Creatures inc. , and GAME FREAK inc.  
****Please support the official realeases.**

***Thank you Clintosaurus, my new beta for this story.  
Check out his profile, he's got an awesome story you should check out.**

*******You can now follow me on Twitter, go to my profile for details.**

_The Pokemon Center.._

Naruto was on cloud nine. He couldn't help but think about his gym victory. Sure he knows that it was close, but thanks to his training of his Pokemon, he won. In addition to his win, he got to meet one of the Pokemon masters. He also had a chance to train his Pokemon under his supervision. He couldn't help but be excited on how great his Pokemon journey was going. He is so excited that absolutely nothing could ruin his good mood.

"Hey, idiot!" Naruto's grin faltered at hearing the familiar voice.

'_Why me_?' he looked up to the sky for an answer. He turned around, a frown in place, and faced the source of the voice. "What do you want Sasuke?" Naruto deadpanned.

"I want a battle. Right now." Sasuke said walking up to the blonde trainer.

"Can't it wait? I wanna look for Master Jiraiya to ask him something." Sasuke grunted at Naruto's response.

"What's wrong? Afraid I won't go as easy on you as Deidara did?" Sasuke sneered.

"Hey! Take that back asshole! That battle was intense!" Sasuke smirked, it was so easy for him to get Naruto riled up.

He just needed to get him hooked, "Yeah, if by intense you mean he was showing special treatment towards you." Sasuke's smirk grew when he saw the look of shook on the blondes face. "After all you are the champion's son."

"Hey! You take that back right now! You know I hate special treatment!" Naruto couldn't help but linger on Sasuke's words. '_Was it all just a show? Did I win, just because I'm the champion's son_?' The thoughts of doubt on his training skills started to rise up. '_Am I really as good as I thought I was_?'

"Oh, I know, but ask yourself this Naruto, do they know?" Sasuke could see that Naruto was thinking about his words. "You may not want special treatment, but your going to get it Naruto. There isn't anything you can do about it."

"Yes there is!" Naruto shouted, "by kicking your ass and then kicking my dads. Then I won't just be the champion, but I also will have the right to everyone's respect. I will finally be out of my dad's shadow and then, then..."

"Then what, Naruto?" Sasuke asked, his smirk not at all wavering. He got just the response he wanted, he knew Naruto would challenge him. Then he will kick the blondes butt.

"Look, you want a battle? Fine we'll battle." Sasuke smirked, there was just one more thing that he had to say.

"Alright, it will be a three on three. Oh and Naruto," when the blonde looked at him he continued, "you can't use your Vulpix."

"What? Why not?"

"Why? Well if it wasn't for that Pokemon you wouldn't have won, besides, I only have three Pokemon. So there is no reason to argue."

Naruto looked down, he looked to the Vulpix, he didn't want to leave him out of the battle. However, he felt as though he had to in order to prove to Sasuke that his gym battle wasn't an act of mercy. "Fine." Naruto whispered.

"What was that? I didn't hear you." Sasuke mockingly put a hand to his ear as if to try and hear better.

"I said 'Fine'!" Naruto shouted. Instead of wincing in pain, however, Sasuke merely smirked.

'_Gotcha_.' He celebrated in his mind. "Okay, well let's do this."

It was at this that their friends came out of the Pokemon Center and was heading there way. They saw the two boys standing apart from each other, as if to start a battle. "What's going on between Naruto-sempai, and Sasuke-kun?" Sakura asked aloud to no one in particular.

"Looks like a battle." Shikamaru stated.

"Yeah, Naruto-kun is going to kick his ass, just like he did with Kiba's." Ino declared, more to Sakura to brag about her crush. However, the only one to say something was Kiba, which was a heated 'Hey!' Ino waved him off though, "please flea butt, you know that Naruto-kun kicked your ass with no effort."

Sakura, who was looking down ever since Ino's deceleration, couldn't help but hold some doubt for her crush. '_Sasuke-kunWill Naruto-kun really beat _?' She didn't even register that she had changed the suffix on Naruto's name. She was more worried about the coming battle, Naruto did beat the gym leader. However, Sasuke did train his Pokemon diligently, so the winner of this is unknown to her.

"Okay, Sasuke, choose your Pokemon." Naruto declared already having his chose picked out.

"You first idiot." Sasuke smirked.

"Fine." Naruto threw a poke-ball, with a flash of light a small Riolu took form. Valor got into his signature stance and was ready for the Pokemon that he will soon face.

"Let's do this Nova." Sasuke threw a ball in the air, it popped open releasing it's concealed light. The light soon took form of a small red and yellow chicken looking Pokemon.

"So, you chose a Torchic as your starter, eh?" Naruto began to think of what all a starting out Torchic would know. "Be ready for anything Valor." Naruto called.

"_As you wish Naruto-sensei_." Valor nodded, his eyes started to glow blue as he stared at his opponent.

Suddenly, the small fire chicken Pokemon shot sand into Valor's eyes, the small Riolu was trying to get rid of the sand. He didn't notice the Torchic coming at him with a glowing beak. With a hit to his exposed chest, Valor was sent across the field a ways. The flying attack had some what of a weakening effect on the fighting type. Valor finally got the sand out of his eyes and stood back up. "_You're going to get it now, bastard_."

Valor ran at a fast pace, Nova couldn't follow him, he found an opening in the fire type's defense. He took advantage of the whole and hit the Torchic with a **Quick Attack**. Valor sent the Pokemon flying a ways, but it wasn't enough to keep the small fire type down. Valor's paws glowed blue as he ran in to get under Nova's guard. He was able to get in a few good hits, until Nova threw him off by using his small talons on his feet to attack Valor. Both Valor and Nova went down, but they soon got back up.

"Okay let's finish this with an **Aura Sphere**." Valor nodded and began to concentrate his aura into his paws. He started to run towards Nova forming a blue sphere. However, when he was about to shove it into the fire types face, the ball of aura dispersed. So the only thing that hit the Torchic was Valor's empty paws.

"Finish it with **Peck**." The fire type obeyed, he hit Valor when he was still confused, with a glowing beak. The second flying attack proved to be too much for Valor, specially since he let his guard down.

"What happened? He was able to do it successfully yesterday." Naruto was shocked by the attack not working and the defeat of his Pokemon.

"It's so obvious, idiot, yesterday was just a fluke. Everyone knows that a Riolu can't use that move until it evolves." Sasuke stated very smugly.

His words did linger in Naruto's mind for a bit, '_is it true? Was yesterday just a chance of luck_?' He looked to his fallen Pokemon, '_I'm sorry I failed you Valor_.' He took out Valor's ball and returned the Pokemon. He then observed Sasuke's Pokemon, the Torchic did seem tough, no doubt Sasuke trained it since first obtaining the Pokemon. Still he had a Pokemon that had a type advantage. "Let's go, Neptune." He threw his ball and let out his Oshawott, the Pokemon glared at the fire type. "Let's do this, hit him with **Water Gun**."

Neptune released a torrent of water towards the fire type, it seemed as though it would make contact. However, without waiting on his trainers command, Nova hopped out of the way and rushed Neptune with some speed. The water type didn't know what to do, before he could turn to his trainer he was hit from the side by Nova. "Neptune!" Naruto called out, Neptune got up, and Naruto released the breath he didn't know he was holding. "Okay, rush him with a **Razor Shell**." Neptune nodded, he ran towards the Pokemon and manage to hit him with a blade of water. Nova cried out as he was sent back towards his trainer.

"Nova!" Sasuke called, "wow, I'm surprised the weakling got a hit in on him. What a stroke of luck." Sasuke commented. His words caused Neptune to develop a depressed look.

'_I should have reacted faster, I can't keep freezing up like this_.' He doesn't know what it is, but unless he is told what to do, he can't really decide on his own. Neptune looked to his trainer, '_I am sorry I'm so weak, Naruto-sama_.'

"Just choose your next Pokemon Sasuke." Naruto was trying so hard not to lose his cool, but he couldn't help but see some truth in Sasuke's words. He didn't have Neptune for long, since he wasn't a wild Pokemon he doesn't have much battling experience. His other Pokemon do, Kurama because he was strong from the start, Puka and Valor were once wild. What can he do though? He looked towards Sasuke, he would bet his bottom dollar that Sasuke has fought wild Pokemon. It's the only way to explain his Pokemon's reaction time without his command.

"As you wish, loser." He threw his next ball, "let's get him, Zeus." Out of the ball came a quadruped green and yellow color dog like Pokemon. Naruto knew it to be called Electrike. "It's iconic, hey Naruto, two Pokemon with godly names, facing off against each other. Wonder who will win?" The names of the two did seem to make sense and it did seem a bit iconic.

'_Should I switch_?' Naruto asked himself, he looked to his Pokemon, he seemed to wanna prove himself. So deciding against recalling him, he let him stay. "Okay, but if I decide to return you, no 'buts' okay?" The Pokemon seemed to agree. "Okay, let's stick with long distance attacks, **Water Gun**." When Neptune fired the attack, Zeus leaped out of the way. He then rushed Neptune and attacked him with a speed attack. Neptune was confused, he didn't know what to do he looked to his trainer, "Neptune, try an **Aqua Jet**, but wait for an opening." Neptune nodded.

He focused on the Electrike, waiting for any kind of opening in the Pokemon's defense. On Zeus's trainer's command, he shot forth a small electric wave towards Neptune. The Oshawott froze, again he didn't know what to do. Then he was hit with the attack, it didn't hurt him, but he felt numb all over. '_What is this? I-I can't move_.'

"Neptune!" Naruto pulled out a ball, "you're coming back, return." The ball shot a red light towards the water Pokemon sucking him back into his round home. '_Damn it, Neptune is paralyzed now, I don't have anything for it. I hope he can fight later on, if Puka can't_.' He pulled out another ball, "you're up, Puka." He threw out a ball, with a pop, bluish white light came out taking form of a Pichu. Puka shook off the rest of the light and faced her opponent.

"It looks like Zues has bested Neptune." Sasuke smirked with his arms crossed. "I knew he wouldn't last, aside to him being a water type, he's weak."

"He's not weak, it's like I-"

"I know, I know, you got it from your dad remember. No weak Pokemon only weak trainers. So what's that say about you? Loser." Sasuke chuckled a bit when he saw the look of shock on his opponents face. '_Good, as long as he loses focus this battle is mine_.' Sasuke couldn't help but smirk.

'_Is he right_?' The thought of doubt wouldn't go away.

"_Whiskers_?" Kurama looked up at his trainer, 'he seems distant, like he's unfocused.' Kurama looked to the Pikachu colored Pichu. "_Puka, try not to lose this, Whiskers needs a win_."

Puka looked to her crush, "_I'll try Kurama-kun_." She turned to face Zues, '_no pressure I guess_.' Sparks flew off her as she fired a large amount of electricity at the quadruped. The attack hit home, and the cry of the Pokemon was enough to get Naruto out of his unfocusness. He looked towards the Pokemon, it was still fine. Naruto shook off the feeling of doubt.

"Alright, Puka, use **Quick Attack **to get in tight and then hit with **Slam**." Naruto told his small electric type Pokemon. Puka nodded and went into try the attack. The other electric jumped high in the air to avoid the attack, he tried to fire another **Thunder Wave**, this time at Puka. However, Puka used the speed she was still using for the earlier attack to dodge the electric move. She didn't know if it would effect her, but she didn't want to find out.

"_Nice move there girly_." Zues said as he landed.

"_Oh, you liked that_? _Well, then your going to love this_." Before Zues could ask what she meant, she was gone. He looked around for her but couldn't find any traces. Then the ground underneath him cracked, he was so confused he didn't get out of the way in time. The Pichu came out of the ground with a **Dig** Attack. The force of the attack sent the Pokemon up in the air. As he was coming down Puka jumped up above him and came down with the earlier attack that he originally dodged.

"Good job, Puka." Naruto shouted when he saw that Zues wasn't getting back up. "Was that weak, or luck Sasuke?" Naruto smirked, the black haired boy never commented. His response was pulling out Zues's ball and returning the Pokemon.

"Come out Lucian." when the ball popped open, a brown bi-pedal dinosaur looking Pokemon with a skull on his head appeared from the light. He was holding some kind of bone.

"A Cubone? Where did you get one of those?" Sasuke didn't answer the blonde trainers question. "Fine, Puka, try a **Slam** and **Quick Attack **combo." Puka nodded.

She got on all fours, and disappeared, she came up to hit the ground type with a strong tackle. Instead of dodging, however, he got down low causing Puka to slam into his hard bone head. The electric Pokemon was in a daze as she was stumbling backwards with stars dancing around her head. Lucian took advantage of her defenselessness by cocking his bone back. Using the object like a bat, he smacked Puka in the gut sending the Pokemon flying.

"Puka/_Puka_." Naruto and Kurama shouted out. The small electric type wasn't getting up. Naruto took out Puka's ball and returned her. He then held up Neptune's ball to eye level, close to his face. "I know you may still be numb, but we gotta end this." He threw the ball, "let's finish this, Neptune." When Neptune came out he flinched when sparks danced around him.

'_Gah, I'm still pretty numb, please let me be able to fight_.' He grabbed his shoulder as the numbing pain shot threw him. He looked towards the Cubone, both Pokemon were silent.

"Let's go, **Razor Shell**." Ignoring the pain, Neptune made a water blade out of the shell from his belly, he then ran towards the skull wearing Pokemon. Lucian blocked the attack with his bone, causing their weapons to lock. The two then broke apart, trying to get into each others guards. But instead of hitting each other, the two attacks locked again. Both stared at each other, neither saying a word, they leapt away from each other. As soon as they landed they were running back towards the other.

Neptune kept trying to attack the Cubone with the water blade, but the Pokemon would always block with the bone. When Lucian switched from defense to offense, that's when the battle took a turn. Lucian parried Neptune's water blade, then whacked the Pokemon with his bone.

"Neptune, **Aqua Jet**." Neptune got his barrings back, once again he ignored the pain of his numbness. He shot off towards the Cubone with water flowing around him.

"Quick, Lucian use **Zen Headbutt**." Lucian charged forth with a glowing skull, when the two attacks connected, the result was a huge explosion. The attacks kicked up a lot of dust everywhere, causing neither trainer visual on their Pokemon. When the dust finally cleared, the two trainers were shocked.

"Neptune!" Naruto ran out to his down Pokemon, both Pokemon were down and out.

"A draw?" Sasuke asked, "A _draw_?!" This time he shouted it. He returned his Pokemon and walked towards the Pokemon Center. He completely ignored the blonde that called out to his Pokemon.

"Sasuke-kun, uhm, congrats?" Sakura tried to Congratulate the Uchiha. Instead of saying thanks he glared at her.

"Congrats? I lost!" He shouted to the pink haired girl.

"But it was a draw." She said, but it wasn't very audible.

"I lost, now leave me alone." He walked off towards the Pokemon center.

Sakura didn't know what to do, other than to just stand there with a shock look on her face.

"Sakura-chan, you okay?" Naruto walked up to her, he was about to say something to Sasuke, but the jerk walked off before he could.

"Oh, Naruto-sempai, uhm, sorry about the draw." She said afraid Naruto might scold her like Sasuke did.

"Oh, yeah, it's okay." Naruto seemed to want to say more, but he was unsure, "are you going to be okay?"

Sakura gave him a small smile, it looked fake but he wasn't going to say anything. "I'm fine Naruto-sempai." She gave another reassuring smile and walked off towards the Pokemon Center.

'_I hope so, please give me a chance, Sakura-chan I care a lot about you_.' Naruto looked on sadly at the retreating pink haired girl.

"Naruto-kun!" Naruto was suddenly tackled to the grown from behind.

"Hi, Ino." Naruto said defeated, he was so focused on his pink haired crush, he didn't notice the blonde female that snuck up behind him.

"I'm sorry about the lost Naruto-kun." Ino said rubbing her face into Naruto's back, while crying.

"It's okay Ino, it was a draw, can you get off me now?" He was trying not to be mean to the girl like Sasuke was to Sakura, but he was still upset about the Uchiha's words, so it was challenging.

"Okay." Ino said, back in her happy demeanor. She got off the spikey haired blonde boy, although with much reluctance.

"I'm going to head to the Pokemon Center." Naruto said, he picked up Kurama, who let him this time, with out complaint. Then he walked towards the center to heal his pokemon.

"We'll come with you." Ino was about to follow Naruto.

"If it's okay with you guys, I just wanna be alone for a bit." Naruto didn't look at them, he was trying to keep his emotions in check.

"But Naruto-kun-" Ino was stopped by a hand on her shoulder, she turned to see that it belonged to Shikamaru. The bored looking trainer shook his head, as if telling Ino to let him go. She listened and, although reluctantly, kept her mouth shut. She could only stand there as she watched Naruto heading in the direction of the Pokemon Center.

_With Naruto_..

Naruto was trying not to cry, the words of Sasuke ringing in his head. '_No such thing as weak Pokemon only weak trainers_. _What's that say about you Naruto_?' That was the first time anyone has ever used his own words against him. He just couldn't believe he lost. Sure it was a draw, but he has always thought he was stronger than Sasuke, what does this say about his training. '_If I had used Kurama, then_-

"Hey brat, what's got you down?" Naruto turned to see who spoke. when he did he saw a tall man with long wildly spikey white hair.

"Oh, hi Master Jiraiya." Naruto said, with the same upset-ness in his voice when he spoke to Ino.

"What's got you down in the dumps? Somebody tell you you couldn't make champion?" Jiraiya crossed his arms over his chest while studying the blonde.

"No, but they might as well have." Naruto still had that same expression in his voice.

"*sigh* Look kid, they're will be some lost battles on the way to becoming champion, even some that end in a draw." Naruto looked shocked by what he just said.

"Were you- Naruto couldn't finish his sentence.

"Yes, you were good, but that kids Pokemon had more battling experience then yours." Naruto looked down at the ground while hugging Kurama. The small fire type didn't mind, he could sense his trainers sadness, so he'll let it slide, this time. "Look, the best way to get more experience is to battle wild Pokemon. While yours does have some impressive moves, they can't think for themselves. Well Neptune can't, the other two are okay, but I think your Vulpix is the best in fact. Your gym battle was proof of that."

"What do you mean?" Naruto looked to the older trainer.

"If Kurama hadn't of pulled off that **Dig** attack, then you would be waiting for another shot at that badge." Naruto looked to the fire type in his arms. "Had Neptune been like that, and thought for himself instead of relying on you. Well, he could have gotten away in time and beat that cubone."

"So what do I do now?" Naruto wasn't too sure on that.

"You train your Pokemon." It was a simple answer but Naruto still seemed down. "Look, I know that Sasuke kid got in your head, but you can't let him get to you. Your a good trainer, I know that and he knows that, he was just messing with you to get you thrown off your game."

"But he was right about my gym battle, it was a stroke of luck." Naruto said, the tears coming out now.

**BAM**

The fist of the older man connected with Naruto's skull. "What did I just say?! Your a good trainer, you have a great love for Pokemon, and you have a heart of gold. Naruto that wasn't luck that won that battle, that was skill. Yes, Kurama did barely make it out of there, but who taught him that move?"

"I did." Naruto said rubbing his sore head, the Vulpix was on the ground, he was growling at the older man for striking his trainer. When his trainer spoke, however, he stopped.

"That's right, was it luck that you taught him that move?" Naruto shook his head 'no'. "That's right, it was skill, plain and simple. Look, all it is that your Pokemon need is a little more training and experience through battling."

"What about Valor? He couldn't pull off **Aura Sphere**." Naruto stated about to get upset again, but stopped when he saw Jiraiya lift his fist.

"That's simple, Valor so far can only do that move, I'd say about one out of three times so far. All he needs is some more training and he'll have it." Naruto was about to say something, but Jiraiya stopped him. "Yes, it is true that a Riolu can't use **Aura Sphere**, however, your Riolu has what it takes to learn it, in fact you and your Pokemon have something that will make you great."

"What's that?"

"Guts," Naruto seemed confused and shocked, "the guts to never give up, no matter what the obstacle. It doesn't matter what anyone says or thinks about you and your Pokemon. All that matters is what you and your Pokemon think about yourselves."

Naruto seemed to have that same burning passion in his eyes that he had when he first started his journey. Only it seemed to burn brighter than before. "Your right, I am a great trainer, and I have awesome Pokemon, I won't give up not even when I beat my dad."

Jiraiya smirked then started to laugh loudly, he put a hand on the boys head and started to ruffle his hair. "'Won't stop not even when you beat your dad' eh?" His smirk was still in place, "well, allow me to help you."

"What?" Naruto was baffled by the master's words.

"Yes, I will take you under my wing, and help train your Pokemon. I'll only be able to do it for a week and a half though." Jiraiya stated while in a thinking pose.

"Why so short? Why not longer?" now Naruto was confused, well more confused.

"I still have research to do for the sequel to my book." Jiraiya answered.

"What kind of research? Is it for a nother traveling guide?"

"No, that one wasn't as good as my other book. The research is, well it's not for kids, lets just leave it at that."

"What kind of book are you writing?"

"Look I told you kid, it's not for the likes of you. Maybe when your older."

"What? Does it have like hardcore action?"

"Oh, it's got a lot of action." Naruto didn't notice the perverted laugh.

"I can handle action, I watch action movies all the time." Naruto stated trying to act older.

"Not that kind of action!" Before Naruto can say anything Jiraiya stopped him. "Go to the center, I'll meet you there later." Naruto pouted but listened to the master.

"Alright, well I'll meet you later at the center then we're off right?" The master nodded. "Okay, well see ya later."

Once Naruto was out of hearing distance Jiraiya rubbed his hands together. "Alright, time to check out those famous Boulder City hot springs." He giggled pervertedly while heading off to do his 'research'.

_Later at the Pokemon Center_..

Naruto was waiting impatiently at the center for his new teacher. Jiraiya never did say when he would be here, but surely he knew it wouldn't take long for Naruto to heal his Pokemon, check out of his room, and re-pack his bag. He decided to try thinking on something other than the late master. '_I wonder what the training will be like_? _It'll probably be intense_.' Naruto was practically bouncing with anticipation, what with the upcoming training with the Pokemon master. He hasn't been this excited since he first started on his journey. He looked up to the sky, '_nice day, good day for some training_.'

"Hey brat sorry I'm late, an old lady needed some help with her bags." Naruto frowned at the excuse.

'_Does he really expect me to belive that_?' Naruto shook his head, "whatever. So, can we leave now?"

"Jeez what's the rush?" Naruto gave the master a not amused look. "Okay, okay we'll leave now. You got everything you need?"

"Sure do." Naruto nodded. He then fell into step with Jiraiya, Kurama resting on Naruto's shoulder. "So what kind of training will we be doing?"

"First, we need to get your Pokemon, especially that Oshawott, some battling experience." Naruto nodded, he was expecting that. "We'll also work on training Kurama to properly use **Iron Tail**, and teach Valor to use **Aura Sphere **at least once in a battle. Hopefully we'll be able to get it to where it won't be his last move he can do."

Naruto nodded at that, but started to think about his words. "I understand Valor, but why Kurama too? I mean he performed the attack pretty great, he was able to use it once before the gym battle."

"Be that as it may, the attack isn't powerful enough." At Naruto's confusion Jiraiya decided to explain his reasoning. "When he attack the gym leaders Exeggutor, that should have been it. Especially with the fire attack before hand, but it wasn't enough. The attack should have been more powerful, but I say it was about halfway there." Naruto looked a bit down hearted. "Hey, cheer up, normally a Vulpix can't perform **Iron Tail**, however, your Vulpix isn't a normal one now is he?"

Naruto looked at Kurama and scratched the fire type's head, "yeah, he is special." Kurama seemed to beam at the praise his trainer was giving him.

"Yeah, that's why I think you can teach him more than **Iron Tail **you might be able to teach him other moves." Jiraiya started, but before Naruto can ask what he means, he speaks up again. "But we'll have to see how much time we have, first experience, then working on there already known moves." He started pondering more. "With the way your Oshawott uses **Razor Shell **he might be able to use it as a defense for close combat, but we'll see where the training goes."

"Sounds like this is going to be awesome." Naruto's grin grew wide across his face as he and Jiraiya walked towards Route 31.

_Route 31_..

Naruto, Kurama, and the Pokemon Master Jiraiya, have been traveling down Route 31 for little over two hours. "Uhm, Master Jiraiya?" The older man turned his attention to the blonde with the golden Vulpix on his shoulder. "Are we going to get some training done today?"

"Be patient, I'm looking for a nice large clearing. Once we find one we'll get started on your Pokemon's training." Naruto nodded accepting the answer. Jiraiya turned his attention back towards the road. "So kid, tell me why do you want to be the champion so badly?"

"Well, I wanna be the best so I gotta beat the best." Naruto lied not sure if he should tell the master about his problems.

"With that attitude you won't make it past the Elite Four." Jiraiya stated frowning at the boys answer. "So why do you really want to be the champion?"

Naruto sighed, '_might as well_.' He took in a breath, and let it out slowly. "Honestly, I'm mad at my father," Naruto narrowed his eyes. "I am always in his shadow, every time someone looks at me they don't see Naruto Namikaze, they see the champion's son. I hate it, all the respect I get isn't because I'm a great trainer, it's because I'm the champion's son." Naruto clenched his fist, "I don't really care if I win or not, I just want to show everyone that I am an awesome trainer. Not because I am the champion's son, but because I am Naruto Namikaze, the greatest trainer ever." His fist kept clenching and unclenching, "I want people to say 'Oh your Naruto Namikaze' not 'Oh your the champions son'." His gaze softened, "if I could just get people to acknowledge me for me then I would feel like a champion." Naruto let out another sigh, '_felt good to get that off my chest_.'

When Naruto finished, Jiraiya began to laugh out loud, "so, your wanting to earn respect. Boy that is rare, most people I know would kill for the kind of respect you have. But I understand kid, in fact makes me want to train you even more." Naruto was a bit confused, "but, I still stand on the only a week and half thing, but if we meet up again, maybe I'll help you out."

"Really? You mean it?" The master nodded, "aww, this is so cool, thanks Master Jiraiya." The older trainer smiled as they continued down the dirt road that was Route 31.

_An hour later_..

Naruto and Jiraiya both sat there bags down, after which, Naruto began to observe the clearing the older trainer chose. It was really large, with plenty of room for long to mid range attacks. A large pile of boulders, good sizes too, and a few dirt patches here and there. "So what are we going to start with first?" Naruto asked, anxious about the training.

"Well, first off let out the rest of your team." Naruto nodded, he threw three poke-balls in the air, each one popped open letting out a bluish white light. Soon Valor, Puka, and Neptune where standing along side Kurama, all awaiting instructions. "Okay, now Naruto I want you to take this rope," he pulled a rope from his bag, "choose a decent size rock and have Kurama lift it with his tail fifty times. Have him rest for thirty minutes when he is done and give him two Oran Berries." He gave Naruto a bag full of Oran Berries. "Then have him do it another fifty times, keep this routine up until sundown."

"Okay," Naruto started a bit baffled by the intense tail strength training. "What about the battling experience? I thought you said that all my Pokemon needed some."

"Well, yes and no. Kurama is good, giving the right advice before hand, he can think for himself should the situation arise. Valor is about the same, but at the same time below him." Kurama seemed to have stood more proudly at that, while Valor's shoulders slumped. "He could use a refresher in 'thinking on his feet' but his reflexes are good, just need to give him an energy boost. He could also do with some aura increase as well, but that will come with training."

Jiraiya took a breath before he continued his critique. "Now Puka has a lot of power for a Pichu, and a lot of untapped potential, I'd say her reflexes are the same as Kurama's, but her in battle strategy could use some work. So she will also be partaking in a crash course of 'in battle strategizing'." He let out a sigh before he started on Neptune, "as for Neptune, well he could use a lot more training, his reflexes are decent, but he freezes up in high tense battling situations. Out of all of them, he is the one I would like to personally train to help him out. From what you told me, he came from a neglectful trainer, who shouldn't be handling Pokemon in the first place. It is understandable on how he is now." He saw the water type visibly get depressed.

Naruto bent down to the Pokemon, "it's okay buddy, I'm sure that by the time the week is up you'll be so strong, that not even Sasuke's Electrike can compete with you." The Oshawott seemed to perk up at that.

'_Naruto-sama, has that much faith in me_?' Neptune developed a determine look, '_I won't let him down, whatever the training is, I'll put my all into it_.'

"Okay, if your all ready," Jiraiya received a nod from everyone. "Okay, Naruto you take Kurama over to those boulders, have him train there. The rest follow me." Naruto's other Pokemon followed the master to the other side of the clearing. While Naruto led Kurama to the boulders.

He searched for a bit before he found a good size rock. Weighing about eight pounds or so, roughly the size of a small football. He took the rope and tied it tight around the rock, then took the other end, and secured it around Kurama's tails. "Okay buddy, start lifting, when you get to fifty you can rest for a bit." Naruto then brought out a familiar device, "when sundown comes, you can have a couple poke-blocks." Kurama seemed to perk up, with a new sense of motivation he began his exercise.

Naruto looked to the sky, it seemed like it would be about two maybe three hours till sundown. Kurama may be doing this exercise for a while, depending on how long it takes him to get to fifty. He looked away from Kurama for a second to observe his other Pokemon. It seems that Jiraiya has his Swampert, Gamabunta, out. The Swampert is famous though, and possibly the strongest Pokemon Jiraiya has. He didn't know what he was telling the small group of Pokemon, but they seemed to be listening very intently to the master.

Naruto was shocked, though, when Jiraiya had his Swampert use **Water Gun **at the blondes Pokemon. He was about to go and deffend them but stopped himself. '_He's just training them to dodge attacks, probably working on there reaction time_.' Naruto winced when he saw Neptune get hit with a blast of water. However, his Pokemon got back up soon after. The blonde then turned his attention back to Kurama. The fire type seemed to be almost done with his exercise. "Okay buddy that's good, rest for a bit." Naruto untied the rope around the Vulpix's tails. He then gave the Pokemon a couple Oran Berries, then they sat there for the next thirty minutes.

'_Boy the old guy sure is working them hard_.' Kurama thought to himself observing his teammates training. '_When did I become such a softy_?' When Kurama's head dropped he heard the sound of the soothe bell. '_Oh yeah, it might be this thing Whiskers mother gave me_.' He pawed the object making it jingle. '_I can't believe I almost forgot about it_.' He looked to his trainer, '_I don't know what it is, wether it's guilt for what happened with the Spearow's or what. But I am really starting to like Whiskers here_.' He shook his head, '_eh, it might just be the poke-blocks, those things are sooo delicious_.' His mouth began to drool at the thought of eating one of those.

Soon the thirty minutes was up, and Kurama was back to strengthening his tail for a stronger **Iron Tail **attack.

_At sundown_..

Naruto stared into the pot of boiling stew, he was wondering just what kind of food this was. He looked towards the man sitting across from him. "Hey, Master Jiraiya, what's this?" He pointed towards the stew.

"Oh! Glad you asked, that's my famous Oran Berry stew." The man grinned, "it's perfect for a end of the day meal. It's also good for people to eat as well. See I put in some spices and some meat marinated in Oran Berry juice." He grinned more as he handed Naruto a small pad of paper. "It's all written down, how to make it and what to get for the stew. Obviously you need lots of Oran berries." He laughed at his bad joke while Naruto groaned.

"So, your going to show me how to make this?" The man nodded at Naruto's question.

"Yes, but first you need to go into the nearest town," the old trainer looked towards the road as if in thought. "I believe the nearest town, or rather village is a small place called Kazu Village. It shouldn't take you long to make a trip there in back."

"Wait you want me to go into town?" The man nodded, "What about my Pokemon?"

"Oh, well just leave them behind." The man waved him off.

"But what if there's trouble?" Naruto questioned.

"Fine, fine take your Vulpix with ya if your that scared." The man waved him off, Naruto growled.

"Hey I'm not scared, I am just being cautious." The older man laughed.

"Yeah, sure kid, whatever you say." The man then began to put some of the soup in several bowls. He handed one to Naruto, "here try it, it's good."

Naruto looked to his Pokemon, they seemed to like it, maybe it won't be that bad. "Okay," he took a bite, he nearly gagged, he started to cough a bit. "I *cough* thought you *cough* said it was safe *cough* for people."

Jiraiya nodded, "I did say that, but see it's an acquired taste." He took a bite of his and began to smack his lips, "hmm, good ol' Oran Berry stew." He took another bite, which caused Naruto to look on in shock.

'_Ugh, well it's really the only thing I have to eat_.' Unfortunately he had eaten the last of his mothers box meals before he arrived in Boulder City. So this meal was the only thing he could eat, well until he gets to that town, then he can buy some supplies to make his own meals. He took a another bite and forced it down. Surprisingly it tasted a bit better, it's not like he is falling in love with the dish, but it's become more tolerable. "So, what's on the agenda for tomorrow?"

"More training of course." Jiraiya answered, but then got into a thinking position. "Well, if we can get them all up to Kurama's level in battling experience. After that I'll work on teaching them all one new move. Well more like your Pichu and Oshawott, your Vulpix should be good for now with Iron Tail and your Riolu has that Aura Sphere. Once they have mastered there moves I'd say our training might be complete by then."

"Really? How long do you think all that will take?" Naruto was really shocked by what all the old trainer wanted to help teach his Pokemon.

"Well, if we stay in this area, and we train from breakfast to lunch and lunch to sundown.." He trailed off as he thought about the length of the Pokemon's training. "Well, you may have to continue the move tutoring, but we shall see, you do have remarkable Pokemon." Naruto smiled at the man's comment.

"Thanks." He grinned as he thought about his Pokemon's training. 'Yes, my Pokemon are going to be so strong.' He laughed to himself as he pictured his champion victory. He still had a long way to go, however, before he is even remotely ready to take on his dad.

_The next morning_..

Both Naruto and Kurama were sound asleep as the morning sun began to drift by high in the sky. Neither of the duo had any clue of the old guy and his Swampert, that were looming over him. The man with wildly white and long spikey hair turned to his Swampert. "Do it Gamabunta." The large Pokemon took a deep breath, he then let loose the water from his mouth. Soaking trainer and Pokemon.

"Gah!/_Gah_!" Naruto and Kurama were both jolted from their dreams with a douse of water. Vulpix stared daggers at the laughing old guy and the old Swampert. Naruto was glaring as well, "what the hell?!" He was not too pleased at having his dream of his crush ruined.

"Glad to see you're finally up." The master trainer said, he then returned his Pokemon and motioned Naruto to follow him. "Once your done with breakfast I'm going to start training your Pokemon. While I am doing that I want you to go into that town we talked about last night."

"Kazu Village right?" the man nodded, "do they even have a shop to buy supplies?"

Jiraiya smiled amusingly, "of course they do." He didn't say anything else, he just sat down and ate his breakfast. Naruto decided to partake in the most important meal of the day.

After breakfast Naruto and Kurama were walking down the path, "head straight, then take a right at the fork." He mumbled the directions to himself over and over so he wouldn't forget. He took the right at the fork and continued on, all the while Kurama was on the blonde trainers shoulder. The shiny Pokemon was looking around and sniffing the area.

'_I swear I smell some kind of presence or sense some kind of danger about to happen_.' The golden fox Pokemon thought to himself. He couldn't quite put his paw on it, but something was causing his gut to churn.

Naruto could finally see the town in sight, it's pretty big for a small village. As he walked into town, the village folk seemed happy to see him. They kept saying things like 'good mornin'' and 'howdy young man'. There were a number of polite greetings thrown his way, Naruto smiled and waved back or said a 'good morning' to the towns people. As he looked closer, however, some who have said there greeting would soon adopt a worrying look on there face. He didn't know if it was because of him, or if there was something going on.

When he found the local shop he saw a bulletin board, with only one flier attached to it. On said flyer was a black and white sketch drawing of a Treecko. It was only of the neck up, but around where the neck should be was a do-rag tied around its neck. Above the picture was one word, WANTED. Naruto read aloud the message below the picture. "Delinquent Pokemon, wanted for vandalizing public and private property. As well as terrorizing town folk." Naruto shook his head, "a delinquent Pokemon? Unbelievable." He mumbled to himself as he walked into the store.

When he got up to the counter to pay, he decided to ask the cashier some questions. "What can you tell me about that poster outside, mister?" The man seemed to know what the blonde was talking about.

"Oh, are you a police officer?" The man asked hopefully.

"Uh, no 'fraid not." the man seemed down trotted, "I'm just a curious trainer is all."

The man sighed, he decided to tell the boy. "Yes, well that Treecko has been causing trouble for us for about a month now."

"Wow, a month?" The man nodded, "how come it hasn't been caught yet?"

"Well, it really only strikes at night, it doesn't attack anyone unless they try to stop it from vandalizing what ever building it wants." The man let out another sigh.

Naruto handed the guy the needed cash for his purchase. "He only strikes at night?" another nod from the man. "How does he vandalize the places?"

"Usually he just attacks them and puts holes or dents into the building, sometimes he'll smear mud, at least I hope it's mud, on the walls." Naruto gasped at hearing this.

"And no cops have tried catching it?" The man shook his head.

"They've tried, but the Pokemon always seems to be too much for them." Naruto looked down, he bid the man a farewell and walked out the door.

On his way out of town he began to think of the Treecko, why it would vandalize buildings, how strong it can be, and the one that just recently came up. '_We'll he strike again tonight_?' After thinking about it, when he was almost back to the campsite, he made his decision. '_Me and Kurama will go into town tonight and try catching this Pokemon_.'

'_What are you planning Whiskers_?' Kurama looked to his trainer as he rode on the blondes shoulder. '_Does he plan on going after that Treecko_?' He assumed, then he developed a grin, '_heh, if he is planning something, then I want in_.' He was unaware that Naruto had already planned on the shiny joining him tonight.

_Night fall_..

Naruto grabbed his flashlight and his backpack, gently he snuck out of the clearing. He was careful not to wake the master, on the off chance the elder trainer didn't approve of this venture. Kurama was on his shoulder, like always, staring ahead into the night. Both were looking forward to the upcoming battle with a wild Pokemon. The last time they had a battle like that was against some wild Spearow, but that was more of a group battle. This would be their first one on one wild Pokemon battle, and if Naruto was lucky, he might get a fifth member to his team.

When they got into town, Naruto didn't need the use of the flashlight. Mostly due to the street lamps that were on through out the semi-large village. He was heading in a random direction just looking for any type of clue that would lead them to the Treecko. Suddenly Kurama lept from Naruto's shoulder and headed off towards a random building. Nothing really special about it, just an average building about medium size. Small in comparison to some of the buildings he's seen in Capitol City when he would visit there with his mom.

Kurama was heading towards this building, as if he could sense something. It wasn't until he heard the faint sounds of a wall being hit that Naruto realized why Kurama was leading him here. When they turned the corner to check it out that's when they saw the culprit. It was a regular Treecko, regular height and coloring. The only thing off about it was the light blue do-rag tied around his neck. The Treecko was bashing his tail against the wall. Then, Naruto saw Kurama step forward to try to get the grass types attention.

"_Hey, what the hell are you doing_?" Kurama shouted, the Treecko stopped bashing the wall to turn towards the fox Pokemon. Then, the grass type pulled down the bottom part of his eye lid and stuck out his tongue. "_Why you_," the grass type started to run off. Kurama heard his trainers command and went with it. "_Get back here you poor excuse of a lizard_!" Kurama dashed off, he was in front of the Treecko in record time. He also shoulder tackled the wood gecko Pokemon sending him to the ground. Kurama loomed over him, "_spill it tree hugger, why are you attacking these building_?"

Treecko spat at Kurama's feet, "_screw off asshole_!"

Kurama didn't like that answer, so he sent a couple of sparks of fire towards the grass type. The Treecko shouted as he tried to get out of the way of the sparks, however, a few hit his tail. "_Be nicer about it this time, why are you attacking this building_?" Kurama had some irritation in his voice.

"_Okay, okay_," Treecko got off the ground and dusted himself off,he closed his eyes. However Kurama didn't see him tense up his body, ready for an attack. "The truth is, your mom told me to, after I rolled off her." Treecko then swung his tail at Kurama who, even though he was steaming mad, dodge the **Pound** attack.

"_Bastard_," Kurama sent a stream of fire towards the wood gecko species, but the grass type dodged the attack.

"_See ya later, freak._" the Treecko shouted, then ran up one wall then lept to another to get to the roof, where he made his get away.

"_Freak? Freak?!_" Kurama started to chase the wood gecko, but lost him when he ran up the wall. "_Hey! Come back here, I'm not finish with you!_" Kurama was aggravated when he saw the Treecko had gotten away, "_DAAAAMN_" He shouted to the heavens.

"Kurama, it's okay," Naruto tried to console his Pokemon, "we'll try again tomorrow night, okay?" The fox Pokemon seemed to be calm after his trainers words. "Come, lets head back and get some sleep." Kurama hopped onto the trainers shoulder, Naruto laughed a bit. He loved it when his Pokemon would ride on his shoulder, it made him feel special. With that they made there way back to the camp, not knowing of the yellow reptilian like eyes watching them.

_Three nights later_..

Naruto and Kurama were heading into the town again, only this was the third time instead of the fourth. After their first encounter with the Treecko they went to the town the next night, but nothing happened. So the night after that one, they stayed at the camp, thinking maybe the Treecko was watching them. In case he was they decided to wait. When they went back into town earlier today, they heard that the Treecko struck the previous night. So, here they are walking into town ready and waiting for any kind of sign. Naruto was surprised that Jiraiya didn't notice them leaving the campsite, either that or he doesn't really care.

"I wonder if we'll run in to him again tonight?" Naruto asked the Vulpix walking in front of him, Kurama was sniffing the ground. Naruto knew the Treecko was a male, he had scanned it while it was down from Kurama's first attack. Didn't tell him anything he didn't already know other then it's gender.

"_There you are_." Kurama said to himself running off into a random alley, while Naruto is hot on his heels. When he made it to the alley he saw the Treecko rubbing mud, at least he hopped it was mud, on a buildings wall. Kurama, not waiting for Naruto's command, dashed off at an incredible speed. He tackled the grass type to the ground, "_we meet again, lizard lips_."

"_Ah, fox freak, missed ya last night_." Treecko got up whipping some dirt from his mouth.

"_Why are you doing this_?" Kurama demanded, "_and don't give me a smart ass comment. Unless you want to cooked extra crispy_." For emphasis he gathered fire in his mouth, giving him an intimidating look.

The smirk left the Treecko's face, instead it was replaced with a scowl, "_humans, that's why_."

"_So you hate humans_?" the fire dissipated from Kurama's mouth.

"_It's not that I hate them, it's there fault that I_-" He looked down trying to hide the sadness in his eyes, but Kurama saw it. "_Look, I'm not telling you jack shit, okay_?"

"_Alright, how 'bout this, we fight. If I win, you tell me everything_." The Treecko nodded.

"_And if I win_?" Kurama looked down hurt a bit, but shook it off.

"_If you win, then me and Whiskers will leave you alone_." The Treecko seemed to like that, so he nodded and got ready. Kurama dashed off, suddenly he was behind the Treecko ready to attack. However, the grass type was ready, he swished his tail and smacked Kurama to the side. He skidded a bit before he stopped. He jumped to his feet and dashed off again.

Naruto, who had no idea what the two had talked about, looked on in shock as the two suddenly attacked each other. He didn't like that Kurama went off without his command, but let it slide this time. Since it seemed like the fire type knew what he was doing. He got a poke-ball out ready and waiting for the Treecko to be weak enough to catch. There was something about this Pokemon that tugged at Naruto's heart, he felt when he looked into the Pokemon's eyes. It was only for a moment, but Naruto saw something akin to sadness or grief. Whatever the reason was for the Pokemon to be doing this stuff it had to be a sad one. He shook his head, he wouldn't be able to find out what was wrong with the Pokemon, but he could try to do something about it.

Treecko was looking around for any signs of the golden Vulpix. When he had tried a **Bullet Seed **on the fire type, he thought it hit, but when the smoke cleared the fox was gone. He then heard a cracking sound underneath his feet, he tried to jump to avoid the underground attack. However, he didn't expect the golden Vulpix to follow him in the air. Nor did he foresee the next attack, the Vulpix did a type of in air summer sault. But the weird part was the fire type's tails glowed a bit, then turned to metal.

Next thing Treecko knew was he was falling back to the ground fast, after being hit hard with six metal tails. He smacked the ground with enough force to cause a small crater to form. He tried to get up, but he couldn't muster the strength. He then felt something hard hit the small of his back. Everything around him turned bright red, he felt himself being sucked into a small space. He tried to break out, but he was just too weak to accomplish the feat. Soon he stopped, unknowingly allowing himself to be captured.

"Yes! We finally caught a Pokemon through battle." Naruto was ecstatic, this would be the first Pokemon to be caught.

Kurama was breathing hard, '_that Treecko was a tough opponent, almost as tough as the gym leaders Exeggutor_.' He looked to his trainer as he tried to catch his breath.

"Hmm, I think I'll call you Verdant." Naruto said to the ball. He shrunk the device to a small enough size to be attached it to his belt. "Let's head back to the campsite Kurama." Naruto picked up the shiny then began the journey back.

_The next day_..

"Come on out guys!" Naruto threw four poke-balls into the air, they all popped open and released a different creature. When they all were out three of the Pokemon were looking at the newcomer. "Guy's this is Verdant, me and Kurama caught him last night." The Pokemon seemed to understand that. "Well, I need to go see what's up with breakfast. You guys try get along okay?" Before he left he looked to Kurama, "your in charge, make sure they don't fight." The shiny nodded and trotted over to the group of Pokemon. Naruto spared one more look at his team, then went off to find out about breakfast.

"_Okay guy's no fighting_." Kurama boredly stated, soon he yawned, "_if you do fight try to keep it down okay?_" The others didn't answer, Kurama was slowly nodding off.

Valor approached the new comer, "_hello, I'm called Valor, it's nice to meet you_." He extended his hand for a friendly shake, but Verdant turned away. "_Hey, I was trying to be nice you bas-_

"_Valor!_" A stern feminine voice called, the small Riolu turned to see the glaring blue eyes of Puka. "_Sorry about that, he tends to get rilled up easily_." Puka stated a bit nervously. "_Well, anyway, I'm Puka, you've met Kurama-kun already, as well as Valor_," she motioned to the Oshawott, "_this is Neptune_."

"_Hn, whatever_," Verdant crossed his arms. Puka seemed shocked by this, soon she deemed a stern look. Before she could retort though Vedant spoke up. "_I don't really want to be here_."

"_Why not_?" Puka was a bit confused, "_Naruto-kun is a really great person. Your lucky to be with him_."

"_Lucky?_" He glared back at the shiny Pichu, "_how exactly am I lucky, hmm?_"

"Well, you see- Before she could continue Verdant cut her off.

"_I'm not lucky if I was lucky then I would still be with _them_!_" He shouted, causing Kurama to stir.

"_Whose _'them'_?_" Kurama asked once he opened his eyes. He may have appeared to be asleep, but he still heard every word.

"_Nobody_." Verdant tried to dismiss it, but the golden fox Pokemon was to determined to stop.

"_No, no, there somebody, so who are they_?" He asked once again.

Verdant let out a sigh, "_you wouldn't understand_."

"_Try us_." Kurama could tell the Treecko wasn't about to speak, so he tried a different route. "_Okay, how 'bout we tell you a bit about ourselves, then you tell us_." The grass type neither agreed nor disagreed with the terms. So Kurama started off, "_I was raised up in a lab, but not a regular Pokemon lab. I don't know how I got there, or how long I have been there. But soon I was freed by the cops, so wherever I was, it wasn't safe. Then after a while I was put in the care of Professor Sarutobi._" Kurama looked down hearted a bit, "_he tried to find a trainer for me, but none gave me a chance. Saying I was too weird looking or I would stand out too much. Then I met Whiskers er, Naruto. Granted we didn't have the best of first impressions, but he never gave up on me._" Even though he had a happy look on his face it soon left when he thought of another event. "_Then I thought I lost him_," it took him a bit, due to him holding back tears, but he soon told them all of the Spearow and Fearow incident.

"_Wow, I never knew_." Puka said, trying to console her crush by rubbing his back. Kurama smiled a bit after a while.

"_Anyway, so who's next_?" Kurama looked at the assembled Pokemon.

"_I'll go_," Valor stated, "_okay, so here it goes, I was once part of a prestiges family of Lucario. We were known as the best fighters, however, I wasn't. I was always called weak, pathetic, useless, you name it, if it was an insult I was called it_." Valor dawned an angry look as he continued, "_so anyway, the day after I finally got the __**Force Palm **__technique down_." He tried to hold back the tears that were forcing there way through. "_I was banished_," he let out a shuddering breath, "_by my own father_." The others gasped at that.

"_Why?_" Puka asked, concerned for her friend.

"_According to my father, I was too weak. See it took me a long time to learn the __**Force Palm **__technique. Because of that I was seen as a weakling, soon after my banishment I tried to learn the __**Aura Sphere **__technique. I thought if I could learn a move that no Riolu could learn they would accept me again_." He clenched his fists. "_But I wasn't even close, as you saw with my fight against that Machop_." He looked to Kurama after saying that.

"_Yeah, I've been meaning to ask, why were you two fighting? I heard somethings for a reason why, but I'm just curious really_." Valor nodded, he got ready to tell the golden fox Pokemon.

"_Well, that Machop, was bullying a Caterpie, and I hate bullies. So I stood up to him and_," He trailed off after that.

"_And got you ass kicked_." Kurama filled in the blanks.

"_Hey, if could have pulled off that attack, I would have won_." Valor stated angrily. "_But then I met Naruto-sensei, and thanks to him I was able to do the move. Well I did it once, but still I pulled it off._"

"_I'll go next if your done, Valor_." Puka stated.

"_Sure go ahead, I'm done_." Puka bowed in thanks.

"_Well, before I met you all, believe it or not, I was called ugly_." The ones that knew her gasped, "_yes, to Pikachu and Pichu standards, I was considered ugly. Everyone would ignore me, or go out of there way to avoid me. I never had any parents, nor did I have any friends, so I had no one to confide in_." She dawned a sad look, "_one day, I was called 'an ugly rat' by my crush. Instead of it hurting me and making me feel depressed, it made me mad._" Her angry face turned to a more peaceful one, "_and it was that night that I met Naruto-kun, and Kurama-kun_."

"_Hey, I was there too, you know_." Valor stated a little depressed.

"_Oh, that's right, sorry Valor_," she gave an apologetic look. "_So, that's how I met Naruto-kun_."

"_Hmm_," Verdant turned to Neptune, "_what about you_?"

"_Oh, me?_" Neptune scratched the back of his head nervously, "_I'm sure you wouldn't want to hear about me_."

"_Eh, everybody else went, you might as well too_," Verdant sighed, "_I'll tell you guys my story if you do, okay?_"

"_Uh_," Neptune looked to everyone, they all seemed to be wanting him to tell Verdant his story. "_Okay, well, I was raised in a Pokemon lab. I was also the last one to be picked by a trainer, and the boy didn't seem too happy about it. He was always calling me useless, and hitting me whenever I did something wrong, or something he didn't like_." His depressed demeanor came back, but he felt a couple of hands on his shoulders. When he looked up he saw that Valor and Puka were trying to comfort him. Even Kurama was sparring him a comforting glance. Tears almost fell from his eyes, "_thanks guys_."

"_No problem, we're teammates and buds, we stick together_." Valor grinned which caused Neptune to dawn a grin as well.

"_Well, anyway, Naruto-sama then fought the guy in a battle to make him stop abusing me. Well when Naruto-sama won, my old trainer just let me go. So then I went with Naruto-sama_." Neptune finished his story which had the same thing in common with the other stories, Naruto was different then any other trainer.

"_Okay, so what's your story lizard lips_?" Kurama asked in his normal, for him, way.

"_Fine, I was once a wild Pokemon, living on my own, never needing anyone else. Well one day I stumbled into a poachers trap, thought I was a goner for sure_." Verdant's attitude seemed to have shifted to a happier one. "_Then, a kindly old man came by, he saw that I was in trouble and helped me out. Well I was about to just go on my marry old way, but my stomach growled. The old guy offered me a treat, don't know what it was, but it was awesome_." Verdant's eyes sparkled a bit at that memory. "_So, then he took me back to his house, and I met with an elderly woman as well_.

"_She was just as kind as the old man, if not kinder. I was a stranger in their house and they treated me as if I was family_." He dawned a sad look in his eyes, "_but, like all good things, might time with them was soon at an end. I don't know how long I was there, but it seemed as if it ended all too quickly. One day while we were eating a meal, some other humans broke into the house. They started throwing spherical things at me, I dodged the best I could. However one was thrown into my blind spot, but when I turned I saw the old woman standing in front of me._

"_Apparently she had taking one of those objects to the back, then she told me to run. I wanted to protest, but she kept insisting. So_," tears started to fall from his eyes, he tried to hold them back, but couldn't. "_I ran, ran away from the only home I ever knew. I didn't know who those humans were, but I cursed them and all humans for what happened_." With a glare he faced Kurama, "_that's why I was vandalizing those buildings. If your still wondering_."

Kurama looked down then walked over to the grass type, and with one of his tails, he slapped him across the face. Before the Treecko could protest, Kurama began to scold him. "_What the hell! Do you think that old couple would be happy about what you did?!_" Before Verdant could answer, Kurama continued, "_they took you in, gave you food. Now, because of some humans, who shouldn't even be called humans, you spit on there memory?!_"

"_Hey I was_- Verdant earned another slap, only this time from, Valor.

"_The bastard's right, you were spitting on there memory, do you think they would be proud of you vandalizing buildings?_" Valor's words brought shock to Verdant's face.

The grass type looked down, '_they're right. I was spitting on there memory_.' He looked to the sky and closed his eyes. '_Please, forgive me, is there anyway I can redeem myself?_'

"Hey guys," before Verdant could find any answers, Naruto returned. He bent down to Verdant's level, "hey, you okay, Verdant?" Naruto asked with serious concern in his eyes, concern that Verdant saw. When Verdant turned his head away, Naruto got an idea. Pulling out a familiar device, he brought out pinkish block.

When the Treecko saw the object, his eyes widened, '_is that?_'

"Here, take it, it's pretty good." Verdant took the block from Naruto.

He put it in his mouth and his eyes widened once more, it was the same taste as before. That same sweet yet bitter taste he grew to love so much. Verdant was shocked even more when he felt Naruto rubbing his head. When he looked to the blond, an image of a kindly old man flashed in his minds eye. '_This feeling, it's the same as before, when the old man and woman took care of me. I feel, accepted_.' Verdant then smirked, '_so, is this how you guys want me to do to redeem myself_?' He didn't expect an answer, but he did enjoy the feeling he now had.

"Come on guys, breakfast is ready, after that it's training time." Naruto stood up, "oh, and welcome to the team Verdant."

At those words, Verdant gained a warm feeling within his gut. '_I haven't felt like this since_,' he never finished the thought. On the count that he felt a hand on his shoulder, he looked to find it belonging to Valor.

"_Come on, the breakfast isn't that bad, and the training is awesome_." Valor grinned before he ran off with the others.

Verdant smirked, "_well, I guess I could stick around for a while_." He muttered to himself, then joined his new friends and teammates.

Naruto looked towards his growing team of Pokemon, '_I can't wait 'til I can challenge my father_.' He grinned as he finally made it to the breakfast area.

_Several days later_..

"Well kid our training ends tomorrow." Jiraiya stated as they all sat around a fire.

"But, they just mastered their moves. Can't we just train a couple more days?" Naruto was anxious, he had a right to be, he was excited cause all his Pokemon learned and/or mastered a new move. Once the other three were up to Kurama's and Verdant's level of battling, they moved on to learning new moves.

Puka's new move she learned was **Volt Tackle**, it took the Pichu a while but she finally mastered the new move. However, the recoil was costly to her, so she would only use the attack under much needed circumstances. At least until she evolved, but until then it has to be an ace in the hole.

Valor was finally able to do an** Aura Sphere **at least once during any battle, without feeling drained. He is still working on doing the move more than once, but it will take a lot of baby steps to get there. Also he manage to get it to where he could throw the attack. However the move is much more powerful if he were to shove it into an opponent at close range.

Neptune had a major confidence boost, mostly thanks to Gamabunta. It's unknown what the Pokemon's words were, but they helped raise Neptune's spirits. Thanks to this he was able to turn his _Razor Shell _from just offense, to defense as well. He would basically wield a water blade like a sword and slash through objects thrown at him. Or he could use the attack for close range defense, just like he felt he should have done against Sasuke's Cubone, Lucian.

Kurama had mastered his **Iron Tail**, a while back ago. So his main focus was perfecting the attack, and his accuracy. He also worked on the power of the attack, he was always coming up with combos that involved the move. He pulled these off whenever he and Verdant would spar.

As for Verdant, he did manage to learn **Grass Knot**, wasn't hard for him to master it. However, it did take him a while to learn the attack, but when he did his spars with Kurama started to end in draws. Verdant was also comming up with new combos that involved the attack. He was also taught **Dig** just in case he needed the attack.

"Sorry kid, but we agreed on one and half weeks, that ends tomorrow." Jiraiya took a sip of his cup of tea that he made for himself and his temporary student.

"More like you agreed." Naruto muttered, he started to stroke the sleeping Vulpix in his lap. In fact all his Pokemon were out, and sleeping. Puka was asleep on Naruto's head, while Valor was leaning on his trainers right side. Verdant had his back to Naruto's left side with his head down and eyes closed, as he soon dozed. Of course Kurama was in Naruto's lap, sleeping soundly, he was enjoying the warmth of the fire and his blonde trainer.

"So, where are you going to go to next?" The elder trainer took a sip, after he asked.

"Well," Naruto thought for moment, trying not to move too much, "probably Wave Town. At least just to get these guys to a center. Then Sand Dune Town I guess."

Jiraiya nodded, "if you get started in the morning, then you should make it there by lunch time."

Naruto agreed with a nod, "uh, thanks, you know for the training."

"Pfft, no problem kid, your Pokemon needed it badly." Naruto seemed to slump at this, slightly disturbing his Pokemon.

"Say, seriously, why did you train me, your a master and I'm just an average trainer." Naruto stated trying to let his Pokemon rest.

"Look kid, I told you, it's a secret," he saw Naruto's down hearted gaze, "fine. Look, the reason why I took you in is because I think you have what it takes to be a great trainer. Also, I promised your father I would."

"What?!" Naruto shouted waking his Pokemon, he didn't notice, "why did he ask you to do that? Does he not have faith that I can be great without help?"

Jiraiya waved his hands to try and calm the blonde, "look kid it's not like that. He does believe you'll be a great trainer. Look, I'm sure you could become great on your own, but there isn't anything wrong with a little help here and there."

Naruto calmed down, "yeah, I guess so." Naruto didn't say anything about the subject after that. "Well, thanks again for the help, I'm going to go to bed." He got up and returned his Pokemon, aside to Kurama.

"Naruto, don't hold such a grudge against your father, one, it's not healthy, and two, there is a lot more to being the champion than just respect." Naruto didn't answer, instead he just climbed into his sleeping bag. Jiraiya sighed, '_jeez, Minato, why did you make me do this? He's your son, well no way around it I guess_.' He put out the fire, then went to sleep himself.

'_Just you wait dad, once we fight, you along with everyone else will see how great of a trainer I am_.' Naruto went to sleep, with Kurama sleeping on his chest. His dreams that night weren't just of his pink hair crush feeding him ramen, like it always was. But of him battling and defeating his father with the team he had now. He smiled as he mumbled, "finish it with **Iron Tail**." Of course nothing happened, but still he slept peacefully_._

**Hello, it's Ino here, next time Naruto-kun makes it to Wave Town. However he notices that there are missing kids, as well as missing Pokemon. Among the missing Pokemon is Sakura's Bulbasaur. Wait what? What's Billboard Brow doing there? Well soon Puka becomes one of the missing Pokemon, *gasp* oh no, I hope Naruto-kun isn't too upset. Oh it seems like there will be an evolution happening. Who will evolve? Will Naruto-kun find the missing kids and Pokemon? Who exactly is behind all of this? Guess we'll find out next time in Chapter 5, Trouble in Wave. Good luck Naruto-kun!**

**(A/N Basicly got a new computer, it's not really new, it's just fairly used. So hopefully I will be able to update more often. Thank you Clintosaurus for being my beta for this story, it was really helpful. Well leave a review if you'd like, if you would like to I have other stories you can check out. I closed the poll I was having on my account, Naruto/TenTen won. I think I will work on that story once I get this one back up and running, along with D:NA, that's Digimon: Naruto's Adventure. Also I plan on continuing that Ninja Turtles and Naruto one as well. Thank you to Naruto the Spiral Ninja for Treecko's nickname.**** Can any of you guess where the dialogue is from between Kurama and Verdant when Verdant was getting away? Take a guess in a review, and those who guess right, if they have a user name, will get mentioned in the next authors note. Well leave a review, follow and/or favorite this story. Ttfn ta ta for now.)**


	5. Chapter 5 Trouble in Wave

**Chapter 5  
****Trouble in Wave**

***Disclamor: The following is a non-profit fan based story.  
****Naruto is the property of Masashi Kishismoto and TV tokyo.  
****Pokemon is the property of Nitendo, Creatures inc. , and GAME FREAK inc.  
****Please support the official releases.**

*******Thank you Clintosaurus, my new beta for his help with this story.  
Check out his profile, he's got an awesome story you should check out.**

***You can now follow me on Twitter, go to my profile for details.**

_Route 31.._

Like any aspiring trainer knows, when you're on a journey there is always a lot of walking involved. Whether you're going from one town to the other, or traveling down the many roads that lay ahead of you. This was the case for our young hero. Traveling down Route 31 may not lead him to his next gym battle, but it did lead to a sizable town with a Pokémon Center. That's what he really needed, sure his Pokémon were fine, but he only had so many Oran Berries. He already used up his stash at the beginning of his journey. This was mostly due to him not being properly prepared.

Of course at the start of his journey he wasn't prepared, he woke up late, got a semi stubborn Pokémon, caught two wild Pokémon, and one Pokémon given to him. His berry supply was enough for maybe two Pokémon. This is another reason why he was glad to have met the Pokémon Master Jiraiya. The man was gracious enough to give him a berry bag full of Oran Berries. Of course he was warned to practice caution when using them. He was also told he should try planting some and checking on them later in his journey.

The man himself was a bit, eccentric, at best. He was always scribbling in some notebook while giggling weirdly. He never met anyone that was like that, but well, it must be true on what they say about not meeting your heroes. Other than his odd behavior the man was truly a master. In the week and a half he and his Pokémon spent with the man the Pocket Monsters improved by leaps and bounds. He's not saying he is ready to take on the Elite Four, but that he feels his charges can hold their own in a gym battle. The master also gave Naruto a notebook full of training tips, and suggestions on how to teach certain moves to Pokémon.

He pulled out his first badge; it shined in the light of the sun. He smiled, however, the words of his rival still played in his mind. _"If by intense you mean he was showing special treatment towards you."_ Was the leader really showing special treatment towards him? He shook away the thought. 'No, there is no way he would do that, besides that battle was tough.' He replayed the battle in his head, with him having a clearer mind then when he faced his rival. With the way the man battled, according to Jiraiya, he usually has his Pokémon use an attack that knocks out both Pokémon. So the battle seemed to have gone like any other battle, when Deidara saw that his Pokémon was about to lose he had them use a move that would take out both combatants.

He shook his head; if he kept thinking of the past like this he was going to get lost. Sure everyone gets lost on their journey, but with him being this early on in his journey. Well he would never be able to live it down if word got out he was lost. "Hey, Blondie, you a trainer?" Naruto turned toward the voice, he saw a kid that looked a couple years younger than him. A ball cap on his head worn in reverse, a blue T-shirt, with no kind of patterns on the garment, yellow shorts, and finally white and blue sneakers.

"Yeah, I'm Naruto." He decided that, if he could help it, he would keep secret that he was the champion's son. Not everyone knew him, but they knew his surname, who wouldn't know that Namikaze was the same name as the current champion. He also planned to keep it secret from gym leaders, if he could that is. If he was lucky, then maybe no one would care either way. But for average trainers he met along the way, he was just Naruto.

"Awesome, names Jurou. How's a two on two battle sound?" The boy now known as Jurou, suggested.

"Sounds good." As soon as he said that, Naruto began to decipher which Pokémon to use. Verdant, his newest Pokémon, may not have been in an actual battle against a trained Pokémon. So, it would appear that he would benefit from the battle. His next choice would be Neptune, the water Pokémon could always benefit from a battle. He turned his attention to his Vulpix, up until now the Pokémon was resting on the blonde's shoulder. When the Pokémon jumped down Naruto bent to his level, "sorry buddy, but the others could use a battle." The Pokémon seemed a bit down hearten, "next time, okay?" The Pokémon seemed to agree, the blond stood up after those words. "You can go first."

"Fine with me," boy stated with obnoxiousness, "Rattrap, you're up." An odd name, but made some sense when a small purple rat like Pokémon appeared from the poke-ball. Naruto knew the creature to be a Rattata. He knew which one to choose.

"Let's do this, Neptune, you're up." When the Oshawott came out he immediately obtained a determined look. He had the shell from his belly in his hand, held behind himself, as if he was going to throw the object. His free hand was out, while bent at the elbow, parallel to the ground. His feet were apart, ready to take off, or dodge at a moment's notice. When he saw which Pokémon he would face first, it didn't really matter which Pokémon he chose. Since he had his chose down to two, he settled on Neptune.

"So, that must be your starter." The boy assumed, Naruto didn't correct him. If the boy wanted to make assumptions, let him. "This should be easy, Rattrap, **Hyper Fang**." The Pokémon's teeth glowed as it ran towards the water Pokémon.

Neptune saw the small rodent coming his way, he didn't bother to move. Had this been a week and a half ago, he would have frozen. Now, he was going through his options of what he could do. He brought the shell from his belly to the front, as he did water gathered around the sea shell forming a scythe like blade. He brought the water blade up into a defensive position. The glowing fang was blocked expertly by the blade; Neptune used the force to break the attack. With the momentum he was going, he spun around and hit the small rodent with the slicing water. It sent the Pokémon back a ways. "_If that is all, then please stay down, I don't want to hurt you anymore then I have to._"Neptune will fight Pokémon, but unlike his comrades he does not enjoy the fighting. He fights only when he is called upon, or if there is no other choice, unlike the others.

Kurama always looked for a fight, same with Verdant. No wonder the two don't get along well, the two are so much alike it's scary. Valor loved to fight, but never seeks it, like himself. Puka was like him, but she wouldn't give the Pokémon warning like he would, she'd just attack until the opponent is down for the count. He may be called too merciful by his peers, but he didn't mind. Being merciful was just who he found out he was, his new mentor, Gamabunta, said that sometimes mercy is good to show, but not to expect it from an opponent.

"_Screw that._" Neptune was also told that some Pokémon were too proud to accept mercy. This was the case with this 'Rattrap'. _"I'll beat you to a pulp."_ With its trainers command he took off.

Seemingly, the Pokémon's attack was fast, but not as fast as to what Neptune was used to. This was thanks to the combat training with Kurama and Verdant, Neptune also knew the draw backs of such speed. If the Pokémon on the receiving end of a **Quick Attack** can follow the movements of the Pokémon using the attack, they could dodge it easily. Neptune jumped out of the way of the attack. "_If you give up now, you won't be hurting as much later, so yield_." Neptune tried the warning again with his defenses up; of course Neptune was always on the defensive at first. Naruto never gave him the command to dodge, but he was told by his new mentor that sometimes your trainer couldn't give such commands in the heat of battle. Sometimes he would have to think for himself in situations that may be direr than this one.

"_Screw off, once I get a hit in, you'll be the one hurting_." Neptune ignore the threat, therefore he didn't say anything in return. Unlike his comrades, who would have said something to the rat Pokémon, he was never one for witty banter and battle taunts. He only produced warnings for his enemies; he was told that sometimes it makes the enemy underestimate you.

"_As you wish, I will show no more mercy, please forgive me for this_." He finally got a command from his trainer. He ran towards the Pokémon, water flowing around him as he did so. The Rattata tried to use a bit of speed to get away from the attack, but the Oshawott could follow him easily.

Wherever the rodent was, Neptune was hot on his tail. Soon the speedy Pokémon wasn't fast enough and Rattrap was stricken by the Aqua Jet. He was then sent into the air high above the battlefield and his trainer. On his decent, he couldn't help but feel as if he should have taking the Pokémon's mercy when he offered, hindsight's 20/20. The last thing to past through his mind before he struck the ground, was how much the impact will hurt.

As soon as he struck the Pokémon Neptune immediately stopped his attack. He still had the water blade around the shell, he never stopped it. He was crouched on the ground slightly. The water blade held behind his back, his free hand on the ground, to hold his balance. He was like this while his opponent was making his decent. He had his back turned to the falling Rattata.

**THUD**

As soon as the sound of the Pokémon hitting the ground sounded out, Neptune stood, dust flowing around him. He turned towards his opponent, with the water blade held in reverse down at his side. His position was relaxed but tensed as well, just in case. There were small cracks in the ground where the Pokémon was, as well as a mini crater. "_Please, stay down, I don't wish to hurt you anymore then I have to_."

"_Good idea_." Rattrap whimpered he didn't move an inch. It seemed as if the rodent took the Pokémon's warning seriously this time.

When Neptune saw that the small Pokémon was giving up, his water blade dispelled, and his position was more relaxed.

"Jeez, your Pokémon's good." Jurou stated, and then returned his Pokémon. "Let's see how it fairs against this one." He threw another ball, out came a small dog like Pokémon, gray and black, a Poochyena. "Rocks, let's do this."

Neptune had a heart of gold, which meant that he didn't really like to fight and hurt others. But he would continue if his trainer wished for him to. Naruto took out a ball and returned the Pokémon. After replacing the now small ball back in its place on his belt, he drew another poke-ball.

"Okay, Verdant, let's show them what's what." Naruto threw another ball in the air; out of this one was a bipedal green lizard like creature.

"How many starters do you have?!" Jurou shouted, Naruto didn't answer. "Let's do this Rocks, **Quick Attack**." The small dog Pokémon obeyed, and shot off towards the grass type. Just when he was about to hit the Treecko, he was hit hard by what felt like a club. He was sent back a ways, but got back up soon after, with some effort.

"_If that's your best attack, then just stay down mutt_." Verdant commented crossing his arms. He smirked when he saw a scowl appear on the dog Pokémon's face.

"_Screw off, ass hole_." Against its trainers command for a **Bite**, the Poochyena decided to go for another speedy attack.

The Pokémon failed to see the smirk grow on the grass type's face. Verdant cocked his fist back, as if he was ready to throw a punch. Then green energy, and what appeared to be grass, started to form around his clenched fist. He waited for the right moment to strike, _'geez this guy is slow_.' He couldn't help the thought, but he was used to fighting faster Pokémon. When the small dog was in range, Verdant let loose the **Grass Knot** hitting the Pokémon square in the chest.

The dog Pokémon cried out as he was sent back, only to land at his trainer's feet. "_Stay down, or I'll stop going easy on you_." Rocks didn't answer, for he had already fainted.

"Geez, that's two good Pokémon you have." Jurou stated returning his Pokémon, "so, which one was your starter?"

Naruto returned his own Pokémon, "this one." He gestured to the golden Vulpix, who jumped to rest on the blonde's shoulder.

"A golden Vulpix?" The boy mused, "that's," Kurama developed a scowl, "so _cool_."

Well Kurama was shocked, to say the least. "Uh, thanks," Naruto scratched the back of his head, "and thanks for the battle, it was fun."

"Yeah it was," the younger trainer stated, "it was also cool meeting a strong trainer, you make me wanna work harder." He pointed at the blond and golden Vulpix, "next time we meet, it will be I who will win." He then made his leave after that.

Naruto couldn't help but sweat drop at the show the younger trainer displayed. "Anyway," He shook his head to clear it, "that was an awesome battle." He looked towards his partner on his shoulder, "right Kurama?" The Pokémon seemed to be upset, "Aw, come on, you can start off next time alright?" He scratched the Vulpix under the chin to help cheer him up, which seemed to do the trick. He chuckled a bit then continued down the path he was once on.

_Wave Town.._

Naruto looked relieved to finally be in a town, mostly because he missed the feeling of a warm bed. Also, so that he could heal his Pokémon at the Pokémon Center, which is what he was currently looking for. As he made his way through the town, he noticed several posters posted on just about every building he passed. All of them had one thing in common, large lettering spelling out, missing. Each one had a picture of a child, boys and girls, they were all missing. Naruto stopped at one; it was a picture of a boy around ten or so. Black hair and wearing a bucket hat, the blond read the text beneath the words missing.

"Inari, age ten, went missing on Monday." He began to ponder that, "today's Thursday, and they haven't found him?" He studied another poster, "all these kids went missing around the same time." Naruto looked concerned as he thought, _'what could have happened for all these kids to go missing_.' He pondered it for a moment more, then he decided to go to the Pokémon Center. There he could try asking around to find out what is going on in the town.

He still studied the posters that were on the buildings around him. He started to get an uneasy feeling in his gut. When he made it to the Pokémon Center, that uneasiness grew. The center was unusually crowded with trainers of different ages, they were all shouting at once. He couldn't tell what they were all saying, but he could see that they were yelling at a blue haired woman in a police uniform. She was trying to calm the trainers down.

"Please, will everyone please calm down?" She called, "look I understand that you all have lost your Pokémon, but we are working on the situation." This only seemed to make the crowd shout louder.

'_Lost their Pokémon?_' The blond began to ponder, '_when did this happen?_' He tried to get closer to hear, but the crowd was just too dense. Soon he grew irritated, "Hey!" He shouted getting everyone's attention, "I don't know what exactly this is all about, but obviously the officer is doing her best to get the situation under control. So why don't you all just let her be, shouting isn't going to do anything but hold off her investigation." This seemed to be what was needed, they soon left, but had sad looks on their faces.

The blond was approached by the female officer, "thank you for your help." She bowed, "my name is Jenny, Officer Jenny." She extended a hand.

Naruto took the offered hand and shook it, "nice to meet you, my name is Naruto." When the shake of hands was done, Naruto decided to try and get some answers, "so, what's going on with those trainers?"

"Oh, well, they all lost their Pokémon." The officer answered.

"Lost as in they were stolen?" The blond queried.

Jenny shook her head, "they just wondered off."

"When did this happen?" Naruto questioned.

"The other day I believe." She looked as though she was pondering something.

"Would you say it was around Monday?" A sense of dread rose up within the blonde's gut.

"Hmm, I believe it was." She still looked as though she was in thought.

Naruto was doing some thinking as well, '_could the two be related?_' He then left his thoughts, deciding to ponder them later. "Well, thank you for answering my questions, Officer Jenny."

The woman smiled, "it was no problem, if you ever need help, you know who to come to." She then saluted.

Naruto smiled, but sweat dropped at the same time. "Okay," he returned the salute, but with less enthusiasm then the woman. After those words, Naruto made his way to the counter to see...Nurse Joy. "Huh, Nurse Joy? Why are you in Wave Town instead of Boulder City?" He asked the pink haired nurse.

"Oh, that must have been my second cousin you saw. She is a Pokémon nurse as well." The woman explained, she then held up a picture, only every woman in the photo looked exactly the same. "See, this is her," she pointed to a, to him, random woman. "And this is Me." she moved her finger to point at another random woman.

'_They look exactly the same._' The blond thought with a sweat drop.

"As you can see other than our occupation, we are nothing alike." She stated joyfully. The Chansey next to her seemed to mirror her cheerfulness.

"Uh, sure, big difference," Naruto shook off the awkwardness, "um, so I wanted to get my Pokémon healed."

"Oh, of course, I will be happy to heal your Pokémon; I just need your Poke-dex." Naruto nodded and pulled out the device. He handed it to the nurse, who took it with a large smile on her face.

"Alright, well let's see here," she inserted the device into a slot on her computer. "Oh, Mr. Nam-

"Shh," Naruto interrupted her, "please don't say my last name out loud." The Blondie pleaded.

"O-okay," the women seemed to be a bit confused, "Naruto, we are all set to receive your Pokémon." She announced once she recovered.

"Thank you, and thanks for not using my last name." The woman nodded, Naruto set Kurama down on a tray. He then took out four poke-balls and set them next to the golden Vulpix.

"I say it will be about one hour before they are fully healed." The nurse indicated.

The blond nodded, "well, I will see you later Kurama." Naruto waved to the vulpine Pokémon. When the Vulpix and four poke-balls were wheeled off, Naruto turned to try and find a room. When he got to the second floor, however, "There all taken?" He asked aloud once he got to the second floor, he could see they all had red lights above the door. Naruto then made his way back to the desk to ask about this. "Excuse me," the nurse gave him her attention when he spoke, "are there any more rooms available?"

She began to check her computer; the sound of typing could be heard. "I'm sorry, Mr. Nami- At the clear of the blonde's throat, she stopped herself, "um, Naruto," she corrected, "there are no rooms available." Naruto slumped at that, she felt bad for the blond, "well, if you happen to know someone who has a room, we can provide a cot for you." Naruto nodded, but he didn't know of anyone that would be here. Even if he did, he didn't like the idea of bumming a room off someone.

"Okay, thank you." with that, Naruto made his way out of the center to the streets. He was trying to find something to do, something to get his mind off the no room situation. As he was walking he came across Officer Jenny, she was talking to a few woman. They seemed to be a bit upset, much like the trainers were earlier at the center. Naruto made his way over there, he was curious as to why they seemed to be upset.

"My little boy hasn't come home yet."

"Have you found my daughter? Where is she?"

"Are you even looking for my sons?"

They all seemed to be arguing about one thing, the loss of their child. "Calm down, please. We are doing everything within our power to find your children."

"Then why aren't they home yet?" one woman asked, the others agreed and were arguing even more with the officer.

'_So these are the mothers of the missing children?_' Naruto thought the rhetorical question. He made his way closer to the crowd; he was trying to think of someway to help the officer. '_I don't know what it is that I can do._' He thought, he doubt it would be as easy as it was with the trainers.

Then Officer Jenny noticed him, "Hey, your that kid from earlier, Naruto right?" The blond trainer nodded. "How would you like to help me with this crisis?"

"Uh, well, I don't know what it is that I could do to help." Naruto stated, not sure why the officer would ask for his help. As far as he knew she had no idea who he really was, which he thought would keep him out of these situations.

"Of course you can, ladies, this is Naruto; he will be helping the police with the investigation." As soon as she made the announcement, the women flooded Naruto. All asking him the same questions that they were asking the officer. He noticed that, while the women were bombarding him, Jenny was sneaking off.

'_Great, well that explains why she called me out._' Naruto was trying to get away from the women; soon he just decided to try investigating the problem. "Okay, okay, calm down, where did you last see your children?" They all spoke up at once, "one at a time, please."

"My daughter was in bed the previous night, then in the morning, she wasn't there." One woman said.

"The same with my son."

"Yeah, and with my two sons."

_'Hmm, there the previous night, then gone by morning, strange.'_ Naruto pondered. "Okay, I will look into this, and I promise, I will try to find your children." The women seemed to accept that, for they all began to go their separate ways_. 'Great Naruto, you just made a promise that you don't even know if you can keep.'_ One woman stayed behind, "uh, yeah?"

"Um, do you think it would help if you could see my daughter's room?" The woman suggested.

Naruto began to consider the offer; it might help him investigate this if he were to check out one of the child's room. Then again he was never officially asked to investigate this matter. In the end he decided to just investigate the matter, it gave him something to do while in town. "Okay, I guess that would help, thank you."

The woman shook her head, "no, thank you." With that she led the blond to her household to start his investigation. While walking she began to question the blond, "so, are you a trainer?"

"Yes, I am." Naruto simply answered, while also walking behind the woman.

"Oh, that's nice; my little Kimiko wants to be a trainer when she is older. Where are your Pokémon?" The woman looked to Naruto for an answer to her question.

"Well, they're at the Pokémon Center." Naruto stated.

"Oh, were you in a battle recently?" She had a bit of a worried look upon her face.

"Yes," Naruto nodded, "I was doing some training before hand as well."

"Oh, that sounds nice," she then stopped walking, "well here we are." She motioned to a plain house. There wasn't anything special about it, just a regular house. She led the blond into the house hold, then to her daughter's room. "I didn't touch a thing when I saw she was gone, I thought the police might investigate, but I guess they just haven't gotten to it yet." She stopped at a door and opened it to give the boy entrance.

Naruto nodded, and then stepped into the room. He began to look around, looking for any signs, or any type of clue. The room didn't look to be in much of a mess, something that would mean a struggle. It was fairly clean; it was either the girls doing or the girl's mother. "Ma'am, do you have any enemies, or anyone who would want to hurt your family?" Naruto asked, and his mom said he would learn nothing from watching TV.

"No, I nor does my husband have any enemies." She stated.

"Where is your husband?" Naruto asked he was really glad to have watched all those crime shows.

"He's away on business in Capital City." She stated, a bit confused.

Naruto nodded, that's when he noticed the window, it was open. He went closer to the window to have a better look. He expected to see an area on the outside chipped away, giving the sign of forced entry. However, he didn't see this; in fact he didn't see any sign of the window being forced open. "Ma'am, did you open this window recently?"

"No, I told you I didn't touch anything in the room, it's exactly how I found it the other day." Naruto nodded.

_'Okay, that's weird, no signs of forced entry, so either the girl let the kidnapper in, or she ran out herself.'_ He needed to ponder this, "Thank you ma'am, I will let you know as soon as possible when I find something." Naruto stated.

The woman then led the boy out of the house, "thank you, please find my little Kimiko."

Naruto nodded, "sure thing ma'am, I will find your daughter, that's a promise." Naruto began to berate himself, making another promise that he doesn't know if he could keep. With another 'thank you' from the worried mother, Naruto headed back to the Pokémon Center.

_The Pokémon Center.._

When Naruto entered the center is mind was a buzz. First he gets to Wave Town to find out that nearly all the trainers there have lost either one or all of their Pokémon. Then he finds out that the Pokémon went missing around the same time as the children. Then to top it all off, he gets roped into the situation. Aside to the detective shows and movies he used to watch, he has no previous investigation experience. All he wanted to do was to heal his Pokémon, rest for a night or so, and then leave for Sand Dune town. Now he has to investigate this. He doesn't have to, but he made a promise, and Naruto Namikaze never breaks a promise.

_'What am I going to-_ "Oof." He was brought out of his thoughts by someone running into his shoulder as they ran past him.

"Sorry!" He heard a familiar voice, when he looked towards the voice he saw the back of a running Sakura. She seemed to be in a hurry, as she was heading towards the nurse desk.

He made his way over, seeing as he needed to check on his Pokémon anyway. When he got to the desk, he could hear some of the conversation.

"No, I'm sorry; no one seems to have brought in a Bulbasaur." Nurse Joy stated upset.

"Can you check again? Please, she has a slightly lighter skin tone then a normal Bulbasaur, and she has a pink bow around her neck." Sakura pleaded.

"I'm sorry miss, but you can go to the police station and talk to them. There have been some Pokémon who have gone missing." Nurse Joy was trying her best to help the poor girl.

"Uhm, excuse me." Naruto decided to make his presence known.

"Oh, Naruto-Sempai," Sakura immediately hugged the boy and began to cry into his shoulder. "It's horrible," she sniffed, after calming down. "Jade, my Bulbasaur, is missing. We were working on some moves for an upcoming contest. I went to gather some berries while she rested, but when I returned she was gone." She began to cry more into the blonde's shoulder.

"Sakura-Chan, I'm sure she's fine, she'll be found soon." Naruto stated.

Sakura stopped crying and look to Naruto, "how do you know that?"

"Because I'll find her, I'm already helping out the police with another crisis so leave it to me." He gave her his signature smile. This caused the girl to smile, then she blushed and switched her attention to the floor.

"Thank you, Naruto-kun." She stated, not even caring about her changing the suffix.

"Naruto?" The blond turned his attention to the nurse; he saw a tray in front of her. He then felt a weight jump into his arms. "Your Pokémon are ready."

"I see that." Naruto chuckled as he began to pet Kurama.

Sakura started to scratch behind the Vulpix's ear. "Hey there Kurama." She smiled.

Kurama cocked his head to the side in confusion, _'what's pinkie-Chan doing here?'_

Naruto grabbed his other Pokémon as Kurama made his way to rest upon the blonde's shoulder. "Oh, yeah, I need to call my mom." Naruto stated aloud. He made his way towards the video phones, not even noticing Sakura following him. He sat at one of the booths, when he did Sakura joined him. "Uh, Sakura-Chan?" She turned her attention to the blond, "any reason why you're here too? Don't you need to get back to Sasuke or something?" He knew that she usually hangs around the Uchiha. He already stated that he would find her Pokémon, so there really was no reason for her to around him. Although he did enjoy her company, he is mostly just curious.

"Uhm, well Sasuke-kun and I aren't traveling together anymore." She stated, getting depressed as she did so.

"How come?" Naruto asked, both curious and troubled by the new information.

"I'd rather not talk about it, okay?" She seemed to have a pleading look in her eyes. Her expression stated, 'please drop it.' So he did, sighing in defeat he nodded.

"Sure," he started to dial his mother's number.

"Hello?" Came the voice and image of his mom, she gasped. "Naruto, I haven't heard from you for nearly two weeks, where on earth were you? A cave?"

"Mom, calm down, I was training my Pokémon with Master Jiraiya." He stated.

"That self-proclaim super pervert?! Naruto Namikaze I swear to every deity if you start peaking in on woman bathing I will make your life a living hell, do you hear me?!" She shouted at her son, Naruto had to hold the phone piece away from his ear. Kurama almost fell off the blonde's shoulder.

"Mom, what are you talking about?" Naruto asked confused by his mother's action.

"Never mind, you haven't known him long enough." she stated.

"What do you mean? I was with the guy for almost two weeks, he's an awesome trainer, and I don't know why you would call him a 'super pervert'." Naruto remarked.

"That's what he calls himself." She answered, "Tell me, did he leave you by yourself for a while while you trained?" Naruto nodded, "I see, I'll castrate that son of a-

"MOM!" Naruto interrupted her before she could finish the cuss. "Sakura-Chan is here."

The red haired woman looked toward her sons pink haired companion. "Oh, I'm sorry I didn't see you there."

"It's alright Mrs. Namikaze." Sakura stated.

"Oh, please call me 'mom' after all Naru-chan intends to ma-

"MOM!" Naruto shouted, once again interrupting his mother.

"What honey?" she then grew a look of realization, "oh, you haven't told her yet."

"Huh? Tell me what?" Sakura asked confused.

"Oh, only that he lo-

"MOM!" Again, Naruto interrupted his mother with a shout.

"What dear?" She asked innocently.

"Look I gotta go; I'll call you again later." Naruto stated, not wanting his mother to embarrass him anymore.

"Okay honey, and don't forget you got that XTranceiver, if you're away from a phone call me on that, okay? I worry." She stated showing her son her worried face.

"Okay mom, I will. Bye."

"Bye sweetie." With that the connection was cut.

"Your mom is really nice." Sakura stated with a smile.

"Yeah, but the woman is a pathological liar." He stated dryly, causing Sakura to giggle.

"So, what room are you staying in?" She questioned as they began their way out of the center. For Naruto it was to continue investigating the missing kids' case, and to let the police know about Sakura's Bulbasaur. Sakura was just following him, due to her worrying over her Pokémon.

"Oh, uh I'm not staying at the Pokémon center." Naruto answered.

"Oh, well where are you staying then, a hotel?" Sakura asked as they made their way down the streets.

"No, I don't have money for a hotel room. I'll probably just camp somewhere." Naruto answered.

"Oh," she began to ponder for a bit, "uhm, if you'd like, you could share my room." She stated with a blush.

Naruto, who had a blush as well, was flustered by her suggestion, "a-are you sure? I mean I don't want to oppose, besides I don't mind sleeping on the ground."

"It's alright, my room is one of the big group rooms, it was the only one available, so there is plenty of room." She stated once she fought back her blush.

Naruto had to consider that, he knew that the group rooms usually always have up to two bunk beds. It's usually for the trainers that travel in groups of two to three. He decided to go ahead with the idea. "Okay, as long as it is of no inconvenience to you."

"It's fine, plus you're helping to find Jade, so it's the least I can do." She stated with a smile. The duo soon made it to the police station.

_The next day.._

In the morning Naruto started to do some investigating, trying to get an idea of how the trainers lost their Pokémon. He found out that they lost them in the same way as Sakura. What was weird was that he found that a couple of trainers lost water Pokémon at the same time. Another trainer lost their Oddish around the same time that Sakura lost her Bulbasaur.

He also visited some of the parents of the missing children. What he found out was that they were all around the age of ten. A few of them kept the child's room how they found it for investigators, so he was able to get some clues. Although this time he had an idea on what to look for. His suspicion was correct, they all left the same way the missing girl, Kimiko, did. Out the window, as if they left on their own. His question was why? That's all he had, questions and no answers. The big one was only a suspicion, are the two cases connected?

It could be true; then again it could just be mere coincidence. However, he did not believe in coincidences, there is a connection, and he intends to find out what it is. Now he and Sakura are out in a small clearing. She was sitting near the edge with Puka in her lap, watching Naruto train his Vulpix and Treecko by having the two fight each other. She found it weird that he gave no commands; he just let the two Pokémon go at it, only it wasn't an all-out brawl. No, there attacks were all planed. Every hit was made with expert precision. She found his way of training amazing.

While those two fought, Naruto's Oshawott and Riolu were having a lite spar. Neptune was working on his defenses. This was done by Valor trying to hit the water type with a **Force Palm**. He was using his shell as a one handed shield, holding it up to take a hit then moving it fast to block another hit. The idea was to get Neptune's reaction time to block up, while also working on the speed of the block. Valor was working on increasing his endurance with using aura so he can accomplish using **Aura Sphere** more than two times in a single battle. As well as not falling limp after accomplishing the move.

Puka's reason on sitting training out is to help comfort Sakura. Who is still upset at the disappearance of her Pokémon. It was helping, every time she would realize that Jade wasn't around she would give the Pichu a lite hug. Puka didn't mind, she hated to see anyone upset, so she was okay with being a 'plushy' for the girl.

Suddenly, Puka's ears shot up, her eyes dilated. She hoped out of the pink haired trainers lap and started to head out of the clearing. "Puka, where are you going?" Sakura called, when she received no answer, she turned her attention to Naruto. "Naruto-sempai! Hurry quickly! There's something wrong with Puka!" She yelled in a panic.

Naruto immediately stopped when he heard her shout his name. After hearing her declaration about Puka, he ran over, his Pokémon in tow. "What is it? Where's Puka?"

"I don't know, one minute she was just sitting in my lap and then suddenly she started to head off. Naruto-sempai I'm so sorry, I should have done something." The girl was in a panic.

"Sakura-Chan, I need you to be calm," when she calmed a bit he went on, "where did she go?" She pointed to the area. "Okay, Kurama." Naruto looked to his Vulpix; he was already ahead of his trainer. He was sniffing at the ground, trying to find the sent.

"_I found her scent, this way._" The Pokémon yipped its name as he went in the same direction that the Pichu went. His trainer and the others were on his heels. They ran out of the clearing and started to take a path that led to a mountainous area. They then started on a trail that was not man made. It seemed like it was used a lot, despite the fact that it didn't appear to belong. The strange trail soon led out an open area. Only they cut across it to go through more bushes. Naruto stopped when he saw that Kurama stopped as well, just outside a couple of bushes.

Peeking through the bushes, Naruto saw a large whole in a mountainside. It was guarded by a couple of guys in suits. The Blondie noticed two things that weirded him out. One was the large radio antenna that was off to the side. Several wires were connected to it that led into the cave. The other thing was the numerous electric type Pokémon that were making their way into the cave. He didn't see a Puka, he saw a couple of Pichu's, but none were Pikachu colored.

"Okay," Naruto started as he and Kurama took their attention away from the scene. "The Pokémon are all going inside the cave. It's guarded by two thugs. If we want in, were going to have to take them out first."

"How are we going to do that?" Sakura asked.

Naruto didn't answer, instead he looked to Verdant. "Think you can handle them?" The Treecko smirked. After nodding he leapt into the trees and was gone from sight. "Now, I'll call Officer Jenny and let her know." He brought out his XTranceiver and began to call the officer.

The two guards stood stock still as they observed the Pokémon walk into the cave. The one on the left side of the entrance, that was closer to the forest, turned to the one on the right. "Tell me again why the boss needs all these Pokémon."

The other guard side, "Listen, 'cause I'm only going to explain it one more time, the boss made a deal with some group. All these Pokémon are just a way for him to get what he wants without spending money."

"The boss will do anything to save a few bucks, isn't that why he go-Gerk." the other guard fell forward without ever finishing his sentence.

"Hey, wha-Gerk." The other guard also fell forward. Appearing out of nowhere on the guards back was a smirking Treecko, wearing a blue du-rag around his neck.

_'Damn I'm good.'_

"Good work Verdant." Naruto remarked as he, Sakura, and Kurama stepped from his bushes. "Now return, it will be easier to sneak around." The Blondie held up a poke-ball and the still smirking Treecko was sent back to his spherical home. "Let's go," he stated. Kurama jumped to the boys shoulder as they entered the cave. "I got a feeling that I'm about to get the answers to my questions."

When the two trainers and one Vulpix got through the entrance, they kept quite so that no one will know of their presence. As they were going through the cave, they could hear an assortment of sounds. It was hard to determine what sound was what, but Naruto could make out some loud Pokémon chatter. "We're getting close, I can feel it." Naruto whispered, Sakura didn't hear him, on the account that the sounds were getting louder. Instead of voicing her question, as to what he said, she kept her mouth shut.

Kurama did hear what his trainer said, and couldn't help but nod in agreement with the Blond. _'Me too, hold on Puka, we're coming.'_ The Pokémon's features turn fierce; he was planning ways to torture the ones who took Puka.

When they got to the end of the hall of the cave, it opened up to a huge room. Naruto peaked around the corner of the entrance, trying to stay out of sight. But he couldn't hold back the gasp. He grew a look of rage from the scene.

"What is it?" Sakura asked, she too peeked around the corner to see what shocked her Blond friend. "Oh my God." Her hands went to her face, she grew a horrified look. She couldn't bare the sight anymore and turned away, she was trying to keep her crying down to a dull level.

The scene in which they saw was this. On the far right side were all the missing children. Their clothes were dirty and a filthy. They looked as though they haven't slept or eaten for days. They were currently being forced to using pick axes on the cavern walls. Standing at the top of the large whole they were in were several men, all armed with whips. Every time the children would falter or stop working, they were whipped until they got back to work.

On the opposite side of the children, were dozens of cages. All of them had Pokémon of different types stuffed into them. The cages were stacked upon one another and looked as though they were ready to be shipped. There were men standing around them, but a couple was wearing different uniforms then the others.

_'I've seen those uniforms somewhere before, but where?'_ He tried to remember why those uniforms were so familiar. Then it hit him, "that's Team Sound." Naruto whispered out in shock. Sakura heard this, with eyes still red and puffy from crying at the scene, she went to the blonde's side to observe.

"Who are they?" She asked the question that was on her mind. She tried not to look at the children, for even the thought of them made her stomach churn.

"They're some kind of criminal group or something. I'm too not sure; I just recognize those outfits as being the same ones worn by the two that were in Boulder City. The ones I told you about."

"So that's them?" Sakura stared shock at the sight of the uniformed criminals.

"Yep, sure looks like it." Naruto continued staring. He then saw someone he recognized from the newspapers. "Is that Gato?"

Sakura observed the short pudgy sunglasses wearing man. He was talking to a tall pale skin individual with long white hair. The tall man was wearing a suit of sorts, black in color. On the back of the suit jacket was a musical note. The known insignia of Team Sound. They seemed to be having a serious conversation, for the white haired man had a lite scowl on his face. While Gato seemed to see the conversation as an amusing one.

"I thought Gato was a humanitarian." Sakura voiced her confusion.

"Well people are different behind closed doors." Naruto stated, he was trying to determine what the conversation was about. Suddenly the three were grabbed from behind by some kind of blue looking vines. They were brought close to a Tangela, and standing behind the Pokémon were the two thugs from the cave entrance.

"Well, looks like we got some nosy trespassers." The one on the right stated with a visible smirk. The other merely nodded; he too had a smirk on his features. They brought the two trainers and the Vulpix to the inside cavern. "Hey boss!" The same guard shouted, getting the short man's attention. "We got a couple of snoops, what do you want us to do with them?"

"Bring down here; let's see 'em!" The man ordered, to which the two men and the Tangela, who still had a hold of the three, made their way down. When they got there, Naruto and Sakura's wrist were tied together before they were let go. Kurama was hog tied, and had a muzzle put on him before the Pokémon was let go. "Now who are you two?"

"Let the Pokémon and the children go, or else." Naruto demanded.

This caused the short man, and all the other men to laugh. Aside to the two trainers, the white haired man was the only one not laughing. "Or else what?"

"Untie me and I'll show you." Naruto stated with the up most seriousness. This caused the man to laugh more.

"Oh, you're a feisty one kid, I admire that. So why are you here? You lost?" He questioned walking around the two teens.

"You took our Pokémon, we want them back. Along with the other Pokémon and the children." Naruto demanded.

"You don't seem to understand. The Pokémon along with the children came of their own free will." Gato stated.

"That's a lie. You're using that radio tower out there to attract the Pokémon and the children." Naruto stated his suspicion.

He laughed again, "My you are a clever boy aren't you. So tell me, what signal am I sending out?"

"I don't know how you're doing it, but the signal seems to react to different types, probably based on the frequency of the signal. You then found a frequency that attracted children under the age of thirteen. That's why none of the trainers left before their Pokémon did." Naruto stated, as soon as the man confirmed his suspicions, the pieces started to fit into place. Finally, he knew what was going on.

The man started to clap this time, an almost evil smirk was in place. "My, quit the little detective aren't you?" He stopped clapping, and started to walk closer to the Blond. "Your right, only the children wasn't intentional; it was merely a mistake made by the test run. But as you can see, I manage to turn the mistake into something more profitable." He walked to observe the children, smirking as he did so. "See there is precious ore buried deep within these caves. So instead of wasting money on a team of untrustworthy workers, I decided to put the children to work." He turned back to face them, "I'll admit that they aren't the best of workers, but think of the money I'll save."

"Well, once you're done then what? When word gets out that you're using kidnapped children as slave labor, you're going to get shut down." Naruto spat at the man.

"Well, then I'll just have to kill them then won't I?" He stated, in which Naruto jumped to his feet to rush the man, but was hit in the gut by a sneaky Sneasel. "It seems you have a lot of fight in you. Tell me which Pokémon did you come for?"

Naruto was wreathing in pain from the hit to his stomach, but he manages to catch his breath. "My Pichu, the Pikachu colored one." Naruto stated.

"Ah, that one, it also has blue eyes correct?" Not waiting for a response, Gato turned to one of the Team Sound grunts. "Go fetch his Pichu, and be quick about it." The grunt looked to the white haired man first. The tall man nodded, with the permission the grunt went off to get the Pichu. "Now, because you have so much fight in you, I'm afraid I can't put you to work, it's too dangerous you see." The man was handed a small machine by one of his men. "So I'm going to dispose of you first, then hand off your Pokémon to Team Sound." A cage with Puka inside was brought to the man. Puka looked horrified and angry at the state that her friends were in. "And what better way to finish you off, then by the hands of your own Pokémon." He flipped on the machine, and as soon as he did, Puka's eyes dilated.

The cage was opened, and Puka jumped out. She went to stand in front of the man, facing her blond trainer. "Now, finish him!" Gato ordered. Puka shot a bolt of lightning at the Blond.

Naruto cried out in pain as the bolt electrified him. When it was over he was still breathing. "Puka. You got. To snap. Out of it.." Naruto breathed out. This seems to have some affect, for Puka's eyes went back to normal.

_"Naruto-kun, what happened?"_ Puka chirped.

"Some resistance? Well then I'll have to increase it." Gato turn the machine to the max. This called for Puke to cry out in pain. She was still trying to fight.

"You can do it Puka, I believe in you!" Naruto shouted. His words seemed to register, for the small mouse like Pokémon cried out trying to fight off the sound. Whether it was the blonde's words and belief, or that she was fighting off the signal, she began to glow white. Naruto stared in shock as he watches his Pokémon grow in size, and change in shape. When the light died down, there was a Pikachu standing in place of where Puka was. She was a slightly darker color of yellow then a normal Pikachu; she also had the same blue eyes. Her tail at the end looked almost like the top of a heart, signaling her gender. "Puka, you evolved into a Pikachu." Naruto stated both shocked and happy.

"It doesn't matter; it will just kill you faster." He went to try and increase the volume, but a yellow bolt of lightning destroyed the machine. "What the?"

Kurama manage to break his bearings around his legs, and then caused fire to come from his mouth to burn the muzzle off. When done, he went and freed his trainer, then freed Sakura. Naruto stood, and then pounded a fist into an open palm. "Now it's time for the 'or else'."

"G-get them!" Gato ordered his men's Pokémon, in which they complied. They went to surround the small group, who was rejoined by Puka.

"Everybody freeze. You're all under arrest." Someone shouted from the cavern entrance, soon a horde of Police officers began to rush into the cavern.

"Kimimaro sir, what should we do?" One of the grunts asked the white haired man.

"Flee; it would not suit the master well if we were to be arrested." The white haired man stated, and then all of Team Sound fled the cave through another entrance. "Our deal is over, Gato." He stated before joining the others in their retreat. Once through the other exit, they sealed it off making sure no one would follow.

Gato and his man had to put their arms up as they were surrounded by Growlithes and armed police officers. Jenny made sure to let her men know that Naruto and his friends were not to be considered suspects. "We got here as soon as we could, thanks for the call Naruto." She said once she approached the boy. Before answering, Naruto could see Gato and his men being hand cuffed and taken out of the cavern, all while the man was screaming protests. "So what's happening? I see that the children are here, they will be taken back to their mothers soon. I'd say there is enough evidence here to put Gato away for a while. So, any idea on what exactly is going on?" She asked the blond.

Naruto began to explain to Jenny all that he has figured out. About the radio tower, and how it was used to send a signal to cause the children to come to the cave. "That's why there were no signs of forced entry at the scenes." He had stated. He went on to tell her of how they then used the same means to attract the Pokémon. He also had to explain that it was a different frequency for each Pokémon type. After the explanation, Sakura was reunited with her Bulbasaur, and the two trainers and there Pokémon were escorted back to the Pokémon Center.

_A couple of days later.._

The children were reunited with their families. During the time after the Gato incident, Naruto received a lot of home cooked meals, baked goods, and several thank you notes. They were all from the mothers of the children. Naruto was giving to them in person by the mothers, who were accompanied by their children, who also wanted to thank the blond. The one he remembers the most, is when Kimiko and her mother came to visit him. They brought a homemade casserole along with a thank you note made by Kimiko.

"When I grow up, I want to be just as strong as you." The girl declared to Naruto. It brought a sense of joy and proudness to himself. The girl also enjoyed playing with Puka and Neptune; they were the only ones who agreed to play with the girl. Her mother also had words of thanks.

"Thank you so much for rescuing my daughter." after which she gave the boy a kiss on his cheek, which caused the blond to turn red. The visits from the other mothers were pretty much the same. Some of the children had the same declaration as Kimiko, and the mothers thanked the boy in the same way as Kimiko's mother did. It's a wonder why the boy's face isn't a permanent red. Some of the children stayed a little longer to continue playing with his Pokémon. He didn't mind, he enjoyed the sight, it reminded him of when he was little and he would play with his mother's Pokémon.

Officer Jenny was the one to see Naruto off, as he was making his way out of Wave Town. While the boy never did get any supplies, giving the events that happened. He did have enough food to last him and his Pokémon a couple of weeks, thanks to the grateful mothers.

"I want to thank you again Naruto, thanks to you we were able to save the children and the Pokémon." Jenny remarked.

"It's no problem Officer Jenny, I'm glad I could help." Naruto stated.

"Please you can just call me Jenny, I'm glad you were in town too. I was about to call in the Champion to come and assist us. But you showed up, and since you were there I figured you could help out." Jenny explained.

"Wait, what do you mean 'call in the Champion'?" Naruto questioned.

"Oh, you didn't know? The police will sometimes call in the Champion to help with an investigation involving Pokémon, if it seems to be too much for us to handle." She informed him. "You know now that I think about it, you do look an awful lot like him. Are you two related?" She inquired.

"Uh, you said that the police usually call on him, is it just Wave Town that does that?" Naruto asked changing the subject.

"Oh, no it's all the police force across the Elena region. I know this cause my cousins are Officers as well." She produced a photo of her vast family. Like with Nurse Joy, they all looked the same. "We're all named Jenny and we're all Police Officers. But other than that there are a lot of major differences."

Naruto sweat dropped at that. 'Oh yeah, they look nothing alike.' He sarcastically thought. "Well I best get going Ofi- I mean Jenny."

The woman snapped to attention and gave a salute. "Thank you again Naruto, for all your help."

Naruto returned the salute, the best he could and with much less enthusiasm as her. "No problem." With that the boy began to walk off, but his thoughts were elsewhere. "I wonder why dad never mentioned that he helped the police every now and then. Of course the man is hardly ever around." He said the last part with a little venom. "Still I wonder why he never mentioned it?"

"Naruto-sempai!" The blond was torn from his thoughts by the sound of the familiar voice. When he stopped his walking and turn, he could see the running form of Sakura.

"Sakura-Chan, what are you doing here?" He asked, once she was in front of him.

"I wanted to ask if I could travel with you. You're going to Sand Dune town right?" The blond nodded. "They have a Pokémon Contest there and I want to enter it. I don't want to travel alone, so would it be okay?"

"Um, sure Sakura-Chan, but I thought you were traveling with Sasuke. By the way, you never did tell me why you two aren't traveling together anymore." Naruto stated.

"Oh, well can I just give you the short version?" She asked.

_'I wish she would trust me enough to tell me the whole story.'_ he nodded. "Yeah that's fine."

"Well, I wanted to come to Wave Town, and Sasuke-kun didn't. So we decided to go our separate ways." She explained, but Naruto had a feeling that there was more to it than just that. He also felt like that wasn't what really happened. But he just decided to shrug off the suspicion, besides he gets to travel for a bit with his crush, a dream come true.

"So, why did you want to come to Wave Town?" Naruto asked.

"Well, to register for contests one would either have to go to Wave Town, or Mist City. Those are the only two places in the Elena region where you can." Sakura explained.

"I thought there was one in Capital City as well?" Naruto asked, remembering the information from the times he's been to the major city.

"That's for the Capital City master contest. You can only register when you have acquired five ribbons from five different contests." Sakura explained. It sounded a lot like what Naruto had to do for the Elena region tournament.

"Ah, well that makes sense." Naruto nodded. "Well, let's get going then, if we want to get to Sand Dune town for your contest, and for my gym battle we better head out." Naruto stated leading the way out of the city. Sakura joined him by his side; the two were walking in step toward the sandy desert that would lead them to the next town, as well as their next adventure.

**Hey everyone, it's Kiba here, I'm going to tell you about the next chapter. Next time Naruto Sakura and Kurama have to travel through a desert to get to the next town. Then once they get there, it's time for Naruto's gym battle. But it seems that the gym closes whenever there is a contest. Guess Naruto will just have to wait on that battle of his. Can he defeat the gym leader and get his next badge? Will he even be able to battle him? Well tune in next time for chapter 6 It's All About the Contests. Man why does Naruto get to have all the fun?**

**(A/N: Thanks again to my beta for the help with this story. Sorry for the long wait guys, but with the added Konoha's Avengers, it's been hard to write for this one and Digimon: Naruto's Adventure. But I love the challenge of writing three stories at the same time, it really tests your imaganative skills. I'm sorry I don't have set dates for chapter releases, all I can say is please hold faith that I will continue this story to the very end. With that, I would like to say thank you to all that reviewed, knowing that you like my story really means a lot to me, and it helps motivate me to continue writing. If you haven't already try checking out my other two stories, feel free to check them out when you get the chance. I will be updating one of those next, hopefully within a couple weeks or so. Don't worry, I'm forcing myself not to start another story until I get the other three finished. Once I do I will work on either new stories, or sequels to one or two of the the three stories I am writing. Also I plan to only do one story at a time next time around, I've learned my lesson. Well ttfn, ta ta for now.)**


	6. Chapter 6 It's All About The Contests

**Chapter 6  
It's All About the Contests**

***Disclaimer: The following is a non-profit fan based story.  
Naruto is the property of Masashi Kishimoto and TV Tokyo.  
Pokémon is the property of Nintendo, Creatures Inc., and GAME FREAK Inc.  
Please support the official releases.**

***You can now follow me on Twitter, go to my profile for details.**

_Shukaku Desert.._

In certain cases some truths can be unfortunate. Like to catch a high level Pokémon you have to weaken it first. To qualify for the Elena tournament you have to first obtain eight badges. Or in order to get to Sand Dune town from Wave town you have to first cross a vast and harsh desert. Where the days are hot and humid and the nights are freezing cold. To travel during the day could cause many things to happen if one is not properly hydrated. Dying of thirst is one harsh thing that could occur, or even a mirage could lead you off course, making you lost out in the wasteland. Traveling at night could cause you to freeze to death, and it is also when the nightly creatures come out. No matter the time of day, one must always look out for a sandstorm, these can happen at any time.

The Shukaku Desert, there was a strange legend behind the wasteland. One that Naruto read of in the book that was written by the master Jiraiya. As he whipped the sweat from his brow, he recollected on the legend as he had read it. Many years ago, before any humans lived in the Elena region, there was a fierce Pokémon by the name of Shukaku. The only one of his kind, a legendary, a massive beast that could control winds and sand. One day the legendary Pokémon battled Arceus, the god like Pokémon of this world. No one knew why the two battled; some say that it was over territory, others state that it was to protect the world from the fierce Shukaku. No one knew, they only knew that the battle was long and fierce leveling the once forested area they had battled upon. When it was over Arceus stood the victor, leaving the legendary Shukaku to die. When the Pokémon did pass, it is said, his body created the vast sandy wasteland. The legend was started many years ago; some say it was a way to prove why there are certain forest areas of the desert. As well as why it was in such a random location. Others don't believe anything of the sort actually happened, but either case could be true, for it is hard to determine which is correct.

He didn't know if the legend was true or not, but Naruto had to admit that the battle must have been awesome to have watched. Two powerful Pokémon going at it head to head, it makes him think of his future battles, especially the one against his dad. "Damn, it is so hot." Naruto groaned out the last part of the sentence. His pink haired companion could only muster a nod. "I wish there was another way to go." Another nod from Sakura. "How are you holding up buddy?" Naruto asked the golden Vulpix that rested upon his shoulder. Kurama could only continue to pant heavily.

"Naruto-sempai, any idea on when we will reach the town?" Sakura managed to ask through her exhaustion.

"According to the map by afternoon, tomorrow." Naruto sighed exhaustedly.

"That long?" The pink haired girl whined, "We'll be dead by then."

Naruto didn't answer, but he started to walk towards a rock structure. There was some shade being giving on the opposite side of the rocks. "Let's rest here, it's not much, but it will keep us cool while we rest a bit." Sakura nodded mustering what little energy she had and made her way towards the boulders.

When they sat down Naruto pulled out a couple bottles of water, he handed one to his friend. The girl practically ripped the cap off and proceeded to chug the liquid. Shaking his head, Naruto pulled out a small white plastic bowl and placed it on the ground. He poured some water out of his bottle into the bowl, where Kurama happily drank. Drinking his, Naruto could fill his throat becoming less and less dry.

"What do you think we should do once we get to Sand Dune Town?" Naruto turned to his pink haired traveling companion.

"Check into the Pokémon Center for one." She stated bluntly.

"Yeah that's obvious, but I meant after that." Naruto elaborated his question.

"Well, I plan on training for the contest. It's my first one, and I'm really nervous." Sakura admitted.

"You'll do fine Sakura-Chan, don't let the crowd get to ya and you'll be great." Naruto patted the girl on the back lightly.

"Thanks, but that's easier said than done. So what about you, what are you going to do?" Sakura asked.

"Well I'm going to try and get a battle with the gym leader." Naruto stated.

"Any idea on who that is?" Sakura asked curious.

"Yeah, Sasori, but that's all I know. The book I have is great, but it doesn't say much of anything about the gym leaders." Naruto took another sip of his water, "I mean, it tells you how to get to each town that has a gym. It also tells you how to prepare for the trip to that town.

"Like, for Sand Dune Town, it states to bring gallons of water. And for Boulder City it mentions to have plenty of repels, if you're in a hurry." He took another sip, "But it tells you next to nothing about the gym leaders themselves. It only gives you tips, like for Sasori; it mentions that you should have plenty of _Antidote _or even _Pecha Berries _with you. From that I gather that Sasori uses poison type Pokémon. I don't really have much that will counter act those types." Naruto took another sip from his drink. "I'm just going to have to work on dodging and try to use long range attacks." When he was finished talking, he had drunk the rest of his water.

"It sounds like you might have a tough battle ahead of you." Sakura stated, finishing off her bottle as well.

"Yeah, it's going to be tougher than the last one," he began to pet Kurama, "but I have faith that my Pokémon will do great, and I'll soon have two badges." He smiled at Kurama as the Pokémon looked up to him. He stood up and placed the two empty bottles and the plastic bowl back inside of his pack. "Well let's get going, we can rest again at night fall." Naruto started to lead the way towards the next town, following the map.

_Dusk.._

The only part of the day that is tolerable of the dessert is dusk. The time when the sun is just setting and the moon isn't completely out. This part of the day is what Naruto was looking forward to. He wanted to do some training in the desert but thought that the sun would be too much for his Pokémon. Except for Kurama, after the short break the Pokémon was right as rain. Naruto assumed that the Pokémon was just thirsty before, now the fire type was enjoying the heat of the desert. Naruto guessed this is one of the perks of being a fire type.

The reason Naruto wanted to do some training is due to a trainer tip he had read in the notes Jiraiya had given him. It stated that a trainer should train his Pokémon in different environments and weather conditions. The notes went on to say that this would help counteract the moves that manipulated the environment or weather. Like training during a rain storm will help the Pokémon endure the move **Rain Dance**. Training in the desert will help to with stand the move **Sunny Day**, which is why he wanted to train in the desert. Another good reason would be to train during a sand storm to help endure the attack of the same name. But it said to do that, you either had to be very strong, or very stupid. Naruto didn't think his Pokémon were quite ready for that kind of training yet.

If he had done some training earlier he knew his Pokémon would faint from the heat, except for Kurama. That's why he wanted to start at dusk; it was still hot, however, not as hot as earlier. With his mind set, he examined the area for a suitable training area. He had a certain area in mind, taking a tip from his book to heart. It had stated that the desert has caves spread across it. The book didn't state why the desert had caves just that these were great places to sleep and rest. If you stay deep inside the cave you could avoid a possible sandstorm. Again, he thought of training during a sandstorm, but that would be too extreme. However, if one of his Pokémon was up for it, he may consider doing so.

After walking for a little longer, the blond finally found what he was looking for. "There, let's head for that cave." Naruto pointed to the fore mention cavern.

"Yay, we can finally rest, my feet are killing me." Sakura cheered, relieved.

"Well we'll rest for a bit, but after that we should train. I want to try to be ready for my battle and maybe you should try to train for your contest." Naruto looked to his companion when he mentioned the final part of his sentence.

"Yeah, do you think you could help me?"

"Well, I don't really know what I could do to help, but I guess I could." Naruto rubbed the back of his head. Secretly he was ecstatic that his crush was looking to him for help, but he was the only one here so he didn't read too much into it.

"Thank you, let's get in that cave, I need a rest." Naruto nodded at the girl's proclamation, he could use a little rest too.

The entrance to the cave wasn't large, but it wasn't overly small either. Roughly the entrance was about as tall as the blonde. A few inches of leeway were all there was, but it was pretty wide. To go deeper the two had to practically crawl to avoid hitting their heads. If there was another cave to utilize then he would take it in a heartbeat. There wasn't, however, so this small cave would have to do until morning.

"It's a tight fit, but it will have to do." Naruto sat down; he pulled out some more water bottles and the plastic bowl from before. "Let's rest for a few minutes, and then we'll get started on some training." Naruto took a swig of water. "Let me do my training first, and then I'll help you with yours, sound good?"

The girl nodded, then took another sip of her water. "Any idea on a strategy for your battle, Naruto-sempai?"

"Well I know Verdant would be able to withstand most poison attacks, plus with his speed and reflexes he'll be able to dodge." Naruto took a sip of water, "Now, I know for sure that it will be a three on three, so I need to figure out who the other two will be." Kurama looked up to Naruto.

"_You better chose me whiskers; don't forget you promised I'd get to fight in the next battle._" The golden Vulpix's yips went unheard for a second.

"Naruto-sempai, I think Kurama wants to be in the battle." Sakura spoke up for the Pokémon.

"Don't worry buddy I didn't forget my promise, you'll be the first in the battle, sound good?" The Pokémon seemed indifferent, but Naruto could tell that the fire type was excited for the upcoming fight. "That just leaves one spot open, now who should it be?" Naruto took another sip of his water and started to ponder the third spot.

"What about Neptune? He may want to try to battle." Sakura suggested.

"Maybe," Naruto took another sip. "Puka just evolved, and she may not be totally used to her new form. If she isn't that could cost us the battle, so I can't use her." Naruto took another sip of water, his bottle was down to the last few drops. "Valor, well I would prefer to save him for another battle, he still needs the training with **Aura Sphere**." Naruto drunk the last of his water, "Well, breaks over, let's get to some training."

Sakura nodded, then finished off her water, the two then started to crawl out of the cavern. Once they were out they could feel the heat of the desert upon them. It wasn't as hot as earlier that day, but it was still humid compared to the climate back in Leaf Town. Sakura started to long for the warm spring like days of her home town, wishing she was there right now.

"Let's get to it guys!" Naruto shouted throwing four balls into the air, unintentionally ripping the girl from her thoughts. "You guys ready for some training?" The four Pokémon gawked at their trainer as if he had just grown a second head. Kurama was by Naruto's side, he was really liking the heat, thanks to a trait that fire types have. He may have been hot before, but most of that was due to dehydration. Now he was fully used to the heat, he raised his head up towards the sun letting it's rays shine down on him.

"_You lot are wimps. What's the matter tree hugger, can't take a little heat?_" Kurama grinned towards Verdant.

"_What did you say fire freak?_" Verdant glared back at his partner. Even though the two verbally fight, when the cards are on the table the two make an awesome team. "_I'll have you know that I like the heat, a perk of being a grass type_."

Naruto looked between the two, he knew the two didn't get along too well, but they did make a great tag team for a double battle. Speaking of, "All right Puka you come here." The darker yellow colored Pikachu slowly walked over to her trainer. She climbed up his leg and body to come to a rest upon his shoulder. "Alright, Neptune and Valor you two team up. Verdant and Kurama you two are going to tag team again." The blond smirked when he noticed a joint groan coming from the Valor and Neptune. This was his way of strengthening a friendly bond between the two, but he figured the two didn't like getting all bruised up. "Alright guys, team one, Verdant and Kurama, will be on defense. Team two, Valor and Neptune of course, will be on offence." He looked to his Pokémon, no visual complaints from them.

Valor slipped into his fighting stance, palms and eyes glowing blue, waiting for Naruto to give the command to start. Neptune pulled off his clam shell and had water appear from the object forming a scythe like blade of water. He held the water weapon behind him and was in his fighting stance for offensive attacks. Verdant and Kurama both just stood there in an almost relaxed stances. Kurama was sitting on his hunches with a bored look. Verdant had his arms crossed over his chest, eyes closed, also a bored look on his features.

It was this about the two that pissed off Neptune and Valor. You'd think they would be smirking, planning to exploit the two Pokémon's relaxed stances. However, the last time they tried that they had their asses handed to them. The two Pokémon both were levels above Valor and Neptune, so much so that they could afford to be relaxed and still win the spar.

Naruto looked between the two groups of Pokémon, taking in how they were, looking for any signs saying that he should not start the spar. Not seeing any, he put the whistle, around his neck, to his lips. "Ready?"

He blew on the whistle, the only ones to move were Valor and Neptune, but it was only a flinch. The two shared a look, with a nod of the head they acted. Neptune threw the blade of water straight for the grass type in front of him. The Treecko never moved, and just when Neptune thought the attack was going to hit, six metal tails nocked the blade off course. Kurama was standing in front of Verdant with his tails to the others, the metal of them dying down.

Valor moved to thrust a palm at the fire type, but his thrust was caught by the green glowing hand of Verdant. Valor moved his other palm for a strike, but it too was caught. The Riolu then went to kick off of the grass type using the hold to his advantage. However, Verdant let go of the two captured palms, just as the Pokémon was making his move. This caused Valor to fall back, giving Verdant enough time to jump away from a **Water Gun **attack from Neptune.

Verdant landed next to a sitting Kurama, then went back to his earlier position. Valor recovered himself then regrouped with Neptune. "_Man, I hate those guys_." Valor complained to his friend.

"_I know, every time we attack one the other defends. I mean if you didn't know any better you'd think the two of them were best friends._" Neptune inspected his shell to see if Kurama did any damage to the object. He didn't, but the water type always made sure that his shell was constantly intact.

"_What do you think we should do?_" Valor looked to his companion.

The Oshawott was trying to figure out a strategy, but he was having a hard time thinking under pressure. "_I don't know, usually when we're like this it's either Kurama or Verdant that has a strategy._"

Valor got into his stance, "_Well I got a plan, you go for Verdant._"

"_But, my attacks won't have an effect on him._" Neptune worriedly looked at the one who would be his opponent.

"_Just try it, okay?_" Valor spared the water type a glare, "_Trust me, plus I have something that I wanna try._"

"_Fine,_" Neptune let out a sigh. Valor took off as Neptune let a jet of water out of his mouth, aiming to hit the grass type. He didn't expect Kurama to jump in front of the grass type and let loose a stream of fire out of his mouth. When the two attacks collided it caused a steam cloud to rise up and cover the area.

'_Amazing,_' Naruto thought as he looked towards the sun, '_he's using the heat of the sun to intensify his fire attacks. Normally **Water Gun **would snuff out **Flamethrower**, but not with this heat._' The blonde smirked at his starter's brilliance.

Neptune stared wide eyed at the steam cloud before him; he thought that his water attack would have repelled the fire attack. He wasn't expecting this steam to occur; he looked for his partner but couldn't spot him. He tried to spot his opponents, but he couldn't see beyond the thick steam. "_Valor! Valor where are you?_"

Valor was expecting the steam, but not this much; he knew that Kurama would jump in to defend Verdant. He guessed that the fire type would use a strong long distance attack. He wanted to take advantage of the steam, with his glowing blue eyes he could make out his two opponents. He threw his arms behind him and started to make a small blue ball. The ball started to increase in size as he ran towards his opponents. The blue of his eyes started to flicker, he was having a hard time focusing on seeing their aura and forming the **Aura Sphere**. Every so often the figures in front of him would appear, and then be replaced by the image of steam. He thrust the attack towards where he last saw Kurama. "_Take this you fox-bastard, **Aura Sphere**._"

Kurama had little time to react, Verdant had already jumped away. The fire type moved his tails to his front as they started to glow then turn to metal. The sphere hit the glowing tails resulting in a huge dust cloud that blew away all the steam. The loud explosion caused Neptune to flinch and fling a water blade to his front for a makeshift shield. Verdant landed on the ground several feet away from the blast zone. Naruto blew his whistle signaling the end of the spar. He then ran out towards the battlefield trying to see pass the smoke.

When the smoke had cleared he could see that Kurama was knocked on to his back, panting. Across from him was Valor, he was panting but not as hard as Kurama. Naruto looked the Pokémon over; he still had his two arms extended forward. A satisfied smirk was on the fighting types face, the Pokémon soon relaxed.

Valor walked over to his ally, he bent down to the Pokémon, "_How'd you like that?_"

"_Not bad kid, not bad._" Kurama panted out smirking.

Naruto bent down to his starter and looked him over, "Man it looks like Valor did a number on you." Naruto chuckled a bit, he handed the fox Pokémon an _Oran Berry _the fire type was more than happy to eat the offered fruit. "Great job there Valor, using the steam to hide your movements, that was a good strategy." He handed the fighter a berry as well, Valor ate the offered food with much satisfaction.

Kurama recovered and approached the fighting type. "_Had I not used my tails that would have done some serious damage, again not bad._" The Pokémon gave a nod of approval then went to stand by his trainer.

Valor went over to Neptune, the two gave a slap of paws then Valor was at the water type's side. "_So was that your plan? The steam and everything?_"

To be honest the whole thing was a complete guess, he was not a hundred percent on the idea working the way it did. He figured it had a fifty-fifty chance of working. "_Yep,_" but Valor wouldn't let his friend know that.

"Alright you guys, get back into your pairs, this time around team one will be on the offensive and team two will be on the defensive." Naruto announced as his Pokémon got into their positions. Neptune and Valor seemed worried though. The blonds guess would be that the two on team one were as great at offence as they are on defense. He shook his head though and chuckled lightly, "Ready?" He blew his whistle, and that's when the hurting and bruising of team two began.

_Afternoon the next day.._

The traveling trainers were sweating so bad that their clothes were soaked. Sakura was for once happy to have a short skirt on with shorts. But she had taken off her scarf, and she was still sweating profusely. Naruto couldn't say he wasn't sweating; he had taken his shirt off and just had his sleeveless hoodie on with the hood up. Luckily his mom had sent the cargo pants that could have the bottoms zip off to become shorts. Kurama, who had fully gotten used to the heat, was walking on the ground enjoying the heat of the sun.

"Must be nice to be a fire type." Naruto stated, to which his companion nodded.

"Are we there yet?" Sakura whined.

Naruto let out a sigh, he was getting annoyed. "It's the same as when you asked me five minutes ago, no." Naruto still had patients, if he didn't have a crush on the girl he probably would have gone off on her.

She sighed, "Any idea on when we will get there?"

Naruto pulled out the book he had and looked at the map, and then read the directions to the town. "According to this, we'll start to see the town once we see the sand dunes. I guess that's why they call it-AHHH!" He never finished his sentence. Being out in front slightly caused him to reach the edge of a sand dune and fall down the side. Not paying attention the blonde had fallen forward and started to tumble down.

"Narut-AHHH!" Sakura was standing at the edge of the dune when she started to call out, some sand gave away and she too was tumbling down.

Kurama was a bit more cautious; he looked over the edge of the dune to see the two trainers rolling down. He couldn't help the smirk on his face, "_Whiskers and pinkie, geez those two are AHHH!_" Even though he was cautious the sand still gave away resulting in the fire type rolling down the hill.

When Naruto finally stopped he stood on shaky legs to see the town he and his companion had been looking for. Like random parts of the area it had trees surrounding it, but the weirdest part was the forest that could barely be seen from his position. With a slightly green area like this you would think the legend of Shukaku and the Shukaku Desert was true. Naruto heard screaming and just when he was about to turn his pink haired companion came rolling down too sweep his legs. This resulted in the blond to fly up for a bit then land with his back on Sakura's. The girl let out a cry of pain when the blond landed.

Naruto was about to get up, but he saw a golden blur heading right towards him. The golden Vulpix hit his face then, due to the momentum, flew up into the air. When he landed he did so with a thud, right on his trainer's crotch. "My master balls!" Naruto squeaked. Once Kurama moved Naruto was able to roll off Sakura and let the girl up. The blonde was sitting with his legs open, head down, and breathing slowly. "Is," he cleared his throat, due to his voice being a bit high pitch. "Is everyone okay?" He managed out once the pain subsided.

"I'm okay, my back hurts a bit." She sent a lite glare at the blonde.

"Hey you tripped me." Naruto counter the glare, but it was replaced with a look of pain as his 'master balls' started to hurt.

Sakura couldn't help but laugh at the pain on her friends face. This caused Kurama to laugh as well. Naruto sent the two a heated glare, but soon he started to laugh as well, occasionally saying 'ow'. "Well we're finally here." Naruto stated standing up; he shook the sand out of his hair and fixed his goggles.

"Finally, I can hear the bed calling my name, oh and the shower. Oh I can't wait to take a shower." Sakura had a goofy look on her face as she thought about taking a shower.

Naruto shook his head, "I second that, let's get going." He led the two towards town, heading straight for the Pokémon Center.

_Later.._

Naruto had finally cooled off, he was sitting on one of the two twin size beds that were in the room he and Sakura had gotten. They decided to share a room again, neither one minded the company. He had just changed his shirt to the orange one he had. He also changed his under garments as well as his pants back to his pair that he had on when he first began his journey. He fixed his goggles on his head then slipped on his shoes. Afterwards he made his way towards the bathroom door, he knocked twice.

"Yeah?" Came the voice of his companion on the other side, he could hear the sound of the shower running. When the two had gotten the room Naruto let the girl take her shower first while he tried to cool off.

"I'm going to head out and look for the gym; you want me to lay your clothes out in the front to be cleaned?" The blonde asked.

"Sure they're just by the door in here." She called. "Come on in and get them."

Naruto couldn't help the blush, seeing as he had permission, he opened the door. He tried not to look towards where he heard the sound of water. He saw the basket with her clothes inside it, "I see them." He announced, then grabbed the basket and closed the door.

"Thank you Naruto-sempai." She called out.

"Y-yeah," Naruto managed out as he went to the door. He looked down to the basket and almost had a large nosebleed from the sight of the girl's lite pink panties. He quickly averted his eyes and went out the door. He placed the basket by the side of the door along with his; he took his and placed it on top so no one would try to take the girls undergarments other than the staff in charge of laundry. Also so that no boy passing by would see the girls panties.

After composing himself, he went down the stairs to see if his Pokémon might be ready for him to take back. Before they had gotten their room, Naruto and Sakura left their Pokémon with the nurse. He approached the desk, where he saw Nurse Joy working. He still couldn't get over how they all look the same. "Excuse me," when the woman gave him her attention she let out a slight gasp.

"Oh, Namikaze-sama," she bowed, "how may I assist you."

Naruto had an annoyed look, he really hated it when people would do that to him. "Uhm, its Naruto, and I wanted to see if my Pokémon were ready? I had the golden Vulpix and four poke balls."

"I'm sorry, but they're not quite finished yet, about thirty more minutes, Namikaze –sama." Nurse joy said with a sweet smile.

"It's Naruto, and thanks I'll be back later then, uhm by the way, where is the gym?" Naruto decided to ask the nurse.

"Oh, well just head out the doors, go right for about two blocks. Take a left and you can't miss it." Joy smiled.

"Okay thank you." Naruto waved as he exited the center.

"Good luck Namikaze-sama." The comment made Naruto grind his teeth. However, he opted to ignore the comment.

He headed the way the nurse had pointed out and was amazed at the sight of the large gym. It was bigger than the gym in Boulder City. It almost looked like a theater where they would put on plays and shows. You would think that, if not for the large words 'gym' on the front. Naruto approached the gym, still in awe by the size; he made his way to the sliding doors. They slid open upon his arrival to them, and the blonde was met by two attractive brunettes. They seemed to be twins, for Naruto couldn't spot a difference between them. They were dressed in a type of blue usher uniform, the kind you would see in a regular theater.

"Hello young traveler." The one on the right stated.

"Welcome to the gym of Sasori-sama." The one on the left came next.

"I'm Mia," The girl on the right called.

"And I'm Tia," Said the girl on the left.

"Welcome!" They announced in stereo.

"Uhm," Naruto couldn't figure out what to say, he was not only caught off guard, but he was also left speechless by the two girls simultaneous actions and way of speaking.

"Just follow Tia; she'll lead you to Sasori-sama." The one on the left said.

"I'm Mia, Tia." The one on the right had a cute glare on her features.

"Oh sorry Mia." The girl on the left sheepishly said.

"That's okay Mia." The one named Mia stated, mixing up the names.

"I'm Tia, Mia." The girl named Tia now had a cute glare.

"Let's just both lead him to Sasori-sama." Said Mia.

"Follow us!" They announced in Stereo.

As they were walking down the hall, Naruto couldn't help but notice the posters on either side of the walls. They advertised various plays and productions; he turned a curious look to the twin girls. "Excuse me, Tia?"

"Yes?" Mia asked.

"He said Tia, Mia." Tia announced.

"Oh, I'm sorry Mia." Mia stated.

"I'm Tia, Mia." Tia had an annoyed look.

"I'm sorry Tia." Said Mia.

"It's okay Tia." Tia stated.

"But I'm Mia, Tia." Mia huffed.

"Girls!" Naruto shouted.

"Yes?" They said in Stereo.

"One, you each have a name tag," Naruto pointed out the two tags on the girls' chest. "Two, I just wanted to know about these posters."

"Oh, well they are the various plays and puppet shows that Sasori-sama puts on." Tia explained.

"Sasori-sama loves puppet shows; he loves to entertain the kids of the town with them." Mia jumped in.

"He's such a sweet guy isn't he Tia?" Tia announced with hearts in her eyes.

"Yeah, but I'm Mia, Tia." The girl stated.

Naruto went around the girls and continued down the hall, "I'll just find him myself." He didn't think the girls notice him leaving, for he could still hear the two argue over the names. "Oh, God am I glad to be rid of them." He said while putting his hands into his pockets. He continued down the hall a bit until he came to a series of double doors. He walked through a set to be met with a large theater like setting. Rows upon rows of seats were strewn about the large room. On the stage he could see a spot light on a boy and girl. They were talking to each other, but he couldn't make out what they were saying.

"Cut!" He heard a voice yell. Then up on the stage came a tall spiky red haired man. He wore a black beret on his head, brown slacks with a white shirt tucked into them. A black vest over his shirt, and shiny dress shoes upon his feet. He held a megaphone in his right hand, he approached the two actors, Naruto assumes they were actors. "That was terrible!" He yelled into the megaphone, probably to get his point across.

Naruto decided to let his presence be known, "Excuse me?!" Naruto shouted so he was heard.

The man with the megaphone looked towards the blonde, he then grew an annoyed look. "This is a _closed _set!" he yelled into the megaphone putting emphasis on 'closed'. "The production will not be premiering for another two weeks, please come back then."

"I'm not here for the show! I'm a trainer!" Naruto shouted back.

"Oh! Well why didn't you say so?!" The man stated, "This is a _closed set_, if you want a battle ask me after the contest tomorrow!" He shouted into the microphone.

"Why after the contest?!" He shouted his question.

Naruto could see annoyed looks on the actors and crew members' faces; he swore he heard a groan come from the people. "Well because the contests are full of such raw talent that I must attend!" He shouted almost happily into his megaphone. "Why? You ask, well I might just find my next star, and I do love a good show of beauty and grace one could always find at a contest! I am also a judge for the affair. So that, my dear boy, is why you must wait 'till after the contest to challenge me to a battle!" Sasori, whom Naruto is assuming he is, stated. "Now go, I have a show to direct!" He shouted into the microphone again. "Now from the top!" Naruto heard the man state as he was leaving.

Naruto let out an aggravated sigh, '_What is with all these gym leaders and blowing off battles?_' He thought as he continued down the hall. As he was walking he started to hear the voices of Mia and Tia. They were still arguing about their names, Naruto rolled his eyes at the twins. They didn't even notice him going around them, "Bye." The two didn't stop arguing even to say bye to the boy as he was leaving. '_Well at least I have time to train._' He thought as he left the building.

_The Pokémon Center.._

Naruto walked into the building with a somber look, it never left his face as he made his way towards the nurse desk. He never made a sound, even when the nurse called him 'Namikaze-sama'. "Are my Pokémon ready?"

"They are Namikaze-sama, just one moment please." She left the desk, going towards the back.

Naruto looked around the center; there were quite a few trainers there. However, with the way they were brushing they're Pokémon he could tell they weren't here for a gym battle. '_They're probably just coordinators for the contest tomorrow._' With that thought he briefly wondered if his pink haired friend was done with her shower. It was during these musings that the nurse cleared her throat.

"Here are your Pokémon, Namikaze-sama." The woman smiled despite the scowl on the blonds face.

Kurama leapt into the boy's arms, happy to see his trainer. "I missed you to buddy." Naruto chuckled.

"If you're wondering where your friend might be, she already picked up her Bulbasaur and left for the cafeteria." The nurse stated.

"Thank you," Naruto left before the woman could reply, he did not like it when people referred to him as 'Namikaze-sama'. He felt as though they didn't see him, but that instead they just saw his dad. That's why he hopes to leave his father's shadow by battling him and showing the world what _he_ can do. When he made it to the cafeteria, he looked for pink hair, which would stand out by like a lot. Therefore it wasn't hard for him to find his companion, she was sitting at a booth near a window, where her stare currently was. The girl in question had a plate of food in front of her, she looked hungry but she was picking at her food. "Hey," Naruto said once he got up to the girls table. He saw a look of doubt in her eyes before it was replaced with surprise.

"Naruto-sempai?" She stated, "Hey." She motioned for him to sit down.

"You okay?" Naruto asked as he sat down in the booth, taking the seat across from her. Kurama jumped up to rest beside his blonde trainer.

"Yeah, it's just," she paused, "can I tell you something?" She asked, and even though she didn't say it, her eyes added 'please' to the end of the request.

"Yeah, you can tell me anything." Naruto stated without missing a beat.

"Okay, well don't tell anyone this okay?" the blonde nodded, "Well, the reason why me and Sasuke stopped traveling together, it's because of what he said."

"What did he say?" Naruto asked prompting the girl to open up to him a little more.

"Well he said that I would never be anything but an annoyance, that there was no reason for me to go to the contests. He said that I would just fail and that stopping would be," she was tearing up at this point. She was trying to control her emotions. "He said it would be a waste of his time, and of his goal."

Naruto stared in shock and clenched his fist, his knuckles turning white from the pressure. "That bastard." Naruto whispered with a bit of a growl in his voice.

"Please don't say anything to him or anyone okay? I try not to think about it, but I still wonder, is he right?" She looked to her blond friend; Naruto could see the hurt in her eyes.

"Fine," Naruto breathed out, "I won't do or say anything to him. And I promise not to tell anyone." He looked at the girl seriously. "But don't you dare think for one moment that he's right. Sasuke is just an idiot that wouldn't know talent if it bit him on the ass." Naruto thought back to when they were in the desert, Sakura's Pokémon showed some awesome moves. The girl was a natural coordinator; he knew she would continue to develop great maneuvers as time rolled on.

The stared in shock at the boy in front of her; her emerald eyes were slowly starting to lose the tears she held back. "Do you really think I have talent?"

"No," Naruto shook his head, which surprised the girl, "I _know_ you have talent." Naruto looked her dead in the eye, serious being written on his face. "From what I saw in your training with Jade, you're going to do great in the contest tomorrow."

"Thanks," she wiped her tears away, "wait, how is it that you know when the contest is?" She asked noticing how the blond worded the sentence.

Naruto rubbed the back of his head, "Yeah, well the gym leader told me." She gave him a look asking for him to explain. "He said that I have to wait until after the contest tomorrow to ask him for a battle."

"Why?" Sakura asked.

"Well, the guy is kinda weird; he said something about talent shining or something like that? I don't know, but he said that he is a judge for it so he would be busy until afterwards." Naruto explained.

"The gym leader is a judge for the contest?" Sakura had that look of surprise again.

"Apparently, yeah." Naruto stated, he then notice the look on the girls face. "Something wrong?"

"I'm more nervous now then I was before." The girl stated, starting to hyperventilate. "A gym leader judging a contest, what if I screw up? What if something happens? What if-" She was cut off when she noticed Naruto's hand over, hers?

"It's okay; it will be okay, just breath." The girl started to calm down, "I told you your great, don't let the nervousness get to you." The girl nodded, she started to calm down a little. She started to get her appetite back for she began to eat her food.

"Well I'm going to get something to eat, and then I'm going to do some training." Naruto got up, but he turned to face the girl, "You should come with me, we can train together, sound good?" The girl just nodded, she had food in her mouth with her cheeks puffed out slightly. Naruto chuckled thinking she looked like a cute chipmunk, "Okay."

_The next day.._

Naruto walked up to the contest hall, amazed by the sheer size of the building. Sakura had already gone ahead of him to the coordinators entrance. He himself was headed for the front entrance to buy a ticket and cheer on his friend. He looked around him at the crowd of people that were also waiting in line to get in to see the contest. Kurama was also looking around from the blondes shoulder; he was a bit overwhelmed by the large crowd. Naruto reached up at started to scratch the Pokémon under his chin.

"Hey, buddy it's okay." Naruto continued to scratch his starter, looking around he wondered aloud, "Did they all cross the desert?" Somebody heard him and gave him a curious look.

"Are you talking about the Shukaku Desert?" A man behind him, wearing a brown suit and a fedora on his head, asked.

"Uh, yeah, my friend and I crossed it to get here." Naruto wasn't prepared for what happened next. The man began to laugh, not a chuckle or a bark, a full on laugh.

"Oh that is rich young man," He saw the serious face of the blonde. "You're serious?"

"Uh, yeah, it was really tough." Now the man had a surprised look about him.

"Why didn't you take the train?" The man asked as the line moved forward.

Naruto stood still for a moment; he finally moved but asked the question on his mind. "Train?"

"Yes," the man nodded, "the train that goes from Boulder City to Sand Dune Town. How else do you think all these people get here? Certainly not through the desert, it's too dangerous, that's why they built the underground rail way connecting the two places." The man explained, the information shocking the blonde.

"So," Naruto had gotten over is shock, but was still upset that he didn't know about the train before hand. "So you can travel to Sand Dune Town _without_ crossing the desert?"

"Yes." The man stated simply.

"Well shit." The cuss surprised the man, "Oh sorry, I'm just a bit upset I didn't know that earlier."

"Well at least you know it now, here." The man handed Naruto two tickets.

"What are these?" Naruto asked looking at the strange tickets.

"My daughter and son-in-law were supposed to accompany me to the town for this contest. But last minute changes prevented them from coming with me, so it left me with two extra round trip tickets for the train." The man flashed the train tickets in front of Naruto, "I would like you to have them, for you and your friend that came with you."

"Thank you, but I don't have anything to trade for them and I don't have much extra money." The man waved off the comment.

"Do not worry young man, after hearing that you bravely crossed the desert, well I say that earns you these tickets." The man smiled, "You can use them at any point in time, so you don't have to worry about catching the train early or something."

"Thank you mister…" Naruto trailed off.

"Aomori Kudo." The man smiled.

"Namikaze Naruto, Aomori-san." Naruto bowed his head.

"Ah the champion's son, well you must be a trainer then eh?" The man asked.

For once he didn't call him sama or anything like that, just asking if he was a trainer. "Yeah."

"Since you're in this line, I assume you're not in the contest." The man stated more than asked.

"Yeah, I'm just here for my friend, she's a coordinator, you?" Naruto asked the man, basically, why he was here in line.

"Moral support for your friend, that says a lot about you Naruto-san." The man stated, "As for why I am here, I enjoy contests, so I try to attend as many as possible. They are quite fascinating. What is your friend's name, I shall root for her." The man chuckled.

"Haruno Sakura." Naruto answered, "She could use it, she's a bit nervous."

"Oh, her first contest? Well good or bad the first contests are always the hardest and toughest for a coordinator." The man stated as he and Naruto got closer to the ticket booth. "I have seen coordinators choke under the pressure, and I have seen their Pokémon choke due to the nervousness of their trainer. You see boy when a trainer is nervous, at times their Pokémon mirrors that nervousness and will sometimes choke or perform badly. That's why I say that the firsts are always the toughest."

"Oh, wow. I hope Sakura-chan does fine." Naruto had a sad look; it didn't go unnoticed to Kudo. He suspected that the girl might mean more to the blond then just a friend, but didn't question it.

"Well, whatever happens, tell your friend this. Never give up, no matter how bad the first contest goes it will only get better from there." Naruto stared in awe at the man. "Like I said, I have been to many of contests."

They got to the booth, Naruto approached the window. "I would like-"

He was cut off by Kudo stepping in, "Two tickets please for the front row, for me and the boy. I assume that Pokémon get in for free?" The ticket person nodded, he handed the man the tickets, and Kudo handed the man the needed money, taking it out like one would pocket change. This told Naruto that the man was obviously wealthy. Kudo handed the blond a ticket, "A present to say good luck to your friend." The man stated.

"Thank you, but you have done too much already, I don't know if I can accept." Naruto stated, hesitant on taking the ticket.  
"It is fine, like I said it is a gift. Please do me the honor and accept." The man handed Naruto the ticket, the spiky blonde took it after some hesitation.

"Thank you Aomori-san." Naruto stated.

"Your very welcome, Naruto-san." The man nodded his head, "Well, shall we take our seats?" The blond nodded, he followed Kudo to the seating area.

_Later.._

Naruto was surprised by how great of seats he had gotten, and it was all thanks to the man sitting next to him. The man, Aomori Kudo, was watching the contestants with interest. He clapped when appropriate and cheered when he felt the contestant needed cheering. They had gone through nine contestants already, and Naruto was anxious to see his friend's performance. He's seen her train her Bulbasaur, the routine she came up with would defiantly impress the judges. Then the words of the man next to him came back to him. If Sakura was really nervous, and even if she could hide it, Jade might pick up on it and… He shook his head, his friend didn't need doubt now what she needs is confidence.

"_All right folks, it's time for the next coordinator,_" The announcer's voice boomed over the large contest hall. "_All the way from Leaf Town, please give a round of applause for Haruno Sakura!_" Everyone began to cheer.

"Yeah, go Sakura!" Naruto shouted over the clapping of the crowd. Kudo smiled, he clapped and gave a cheering whistle for the pink hair girl.

Naruto's breath caught in his throat when he saw Sakura's outfit, this was the first time he's seen the dress. She was clad in a formal red gown, which puffed out at the bottom. Three big lite red bows went down the right side; the top left her shoulders bare but covered a bit of her arms. She had on long white gloves; her hands shook slightly due to her nerves. Her pink hair was doubled layered in the back; the upper part was clipped tight with a lite red bow that matched the ones on her dress. The bottom layer of her pink hair was left to flow down to cover her upper back. Her two bangs still hung in front framing her face. She had on lite touches of makeup, nothing too heavy, just enough to make her eyes stand out and to look more beautiful then she normally was. That was Naruto's thought.

Sakura looked at the crowd; she swallowed a hard lump in her throat. '_Here goes._' She held out her poke ball that was inside a blue cover. A pink flower sticker was on the front of the blue cover. She held it with both hands extended, she had her eyes closed. She brought the ball to her lips and gave it a lite kiss. Opening her eyes slowly, she spun around and threw the ball into the air. However, during her spin she almost tripped, and that is when it started to go south. "C-come o-on out J-Jade!" She announced, but was stuttering due to the embarrassment of her almost trip.

The ball popped, as it did pink cherry blossom petals started to rain down from the ball as a Bulbasaur came out. The Bulbasaur had a lite red bow on her ear, to match her trainers theme. She landed, but she too was nervous, she forgot her routine and froze. Instead of catching herself with a **Vine Whip** then lowering herself down to the stage, no instead she landed with a flop. When she righted herself and saw the crowd, she just stood in shock.

"Don't be nervous Jade, w-we can do this." The almost stutter and doubt in her voice did not help the grass type. Sakura looked around, in a nervous shock.

"You can start anytime you want, Haruno-san." Sasori, whom she knew thanks to Naruto, stated. The man was still wearing the beret from when Naruto had met him. But his vest he wore was a lite purple color, over a bluish violet shirt that was tucked into a pair of black slacks.

Sakura continued to look into the crowd, until she caught a glimpse of blond hair. She focused on it and saw Naruto in the second row from the stage. She wasn't expecting him to be that close, she could almost hear Naruto's voice over the crowd. He was telling her to not be nervous, either that or he wanted room service. The lite joke calmed her nerves a bit. "Come on Jade, let's do this."

Jade looked around, she was still nervous, the Bulbasaur wasn't expecting this big of a crowd. She barely heard her trainers command; she shook her head to focus. After her trainer said the attack once again, she let loose a barrage of leaves. She was supposed to use a **Leech Seed** attack then a **Razor Leaf**. She messed up, and was more embarrassed then before that she froze, not even moving when her trainer called to her.

Sakura reluctantly returned Jade to her ball; she faced the judges with a red face of embarrassment. All she wanted to do now was to run and cry, she wanted to lock herself away and never leave the room. As she looked from the judges to the crowd she caught sight of Naruto. The blond was looking at her with concern in his eyes. She couldn't face him, not when she let him down, he had helped her train and she failed. She turned her gaze away and focused on the judges.

"I'm going to give you a two," Sasori was the first to speak. "While your dress and outfit of your Pokémon matched perfectly with your routine, your Pokémon's routine however needs some work. While I'm sure your Bulbasaur was just nervous, make sure that next time you focus mostly on your Pokémon's resolve, rather than your opening routine." Sasori finished the critic and while the other two judges had similar things to say their final score wasn't as generous as Sasori's. She got a one from the last two judges, all because she didn't focus that much on Jade's nerves. She felt stupid; she failed because of some idiotic mistake like that.

When they were done, she turned around to leave the stage, a slow leave at first. Once she was out of sight of the crowd, she ran to the locker room of the stadium with tears in her eyes. She was mostly upset with herself, thinking things along the lines that she wasn't meant to be a trainer. Her parents were shop owners back in Leaf Town; they didn't even have a Pokémon as a pet. She was the first of her family to get a trainer's license; she had wanted to be a coordinator. She wanted this ever since she was a little girl, when she saw a small friendly contest that came to Leaf Town. She loved every second of it, so she decided that she wanted to be a coordinator. However, as she left the stage she felt that dream die.

Naruto was from a family of trainers, his dad is the champion and his mother was once a coordinator. Sasuke too came from a family of trainers, his brother is a gym leader, and his father was the previous gym leader. One day she knew that Sasuke would be the gym leader of the family gym. She, however, felt like she was only playing trainer. With that the tears started to become rapid.

Naruto watched his friend leave the stage; he knew she needed some comfort. He got up with a confused Kurama on his shoulders. "I need to go."

"Naruto," Kudo started, "don't forget what I told you earlier."

Naruto thought for a second, after remembering what the man had said he nodded. "Right, thanks Aomori-san." Naruto ran off to where he thought the coordinators would be.

It took the blond a while but after asking someone and looking for signs he managed to find the area where Sakura would be. When he opened the door to the locker room he heard sobbing. He knocked first before entering.

"Who's there?" Sakura asked trying to keep her voice steady.

"It's me." Naruto called into the room.

"Sempai?"

"Can I come in?"

"No, please I-I just need some time." He heard her start to cry again. He took a breath and went with his gut, he walked into the room. The sobs got louder as he got closer, when he rounded a corner he saw the girl with her face in her hands. Her shoulders were shaking and sobbing sounds could be heard clearly now. He sat next to her on the bench and pulled her into a hug.

Sakura was shocked at first, but she was too upset to protest. Instead of pushing him away she wrapped her arms around him and cried into his shoulder. Her shoulders still shook, but lessened as Naruto rubbed her back. He didn't say anything; he just continued to hold her and rubbed her back. Patiently he waited for her to calm down enough to speak her mind.

After a few moments her crying started to die down, soon sobbing started to die down as well. She slowly left the hug that she had with Naruto. The latter was a bit upset at the lack of presence in his arms. He didn't say anything, when he pulled away he saw Kurama jump from the floor to land in the girls lap. Naruto smiled, it seemed that Kurama didn't want the girl to be upset either.

"I'm pathetic aren't I?" Sakura stated, "Sasuke-kun was right, I lost just like he said I would."

"Sakura-Chan stop that." Naruto got a confused look from the pink hair girl. "You are not pathetic; you did a great job in training Jade. Yes, she choked under the pressure but it's your first contest. Look don't give up, keep going at it, I think everyone's first contest is like this one was. No one is that ready for it, but that doesn't mean you should give up. Keep going 'cause from here on it will only get easier. The hard part is over, and now you know what to work and focus on." He grasped her hand and gave a lite squeeze. "I'll help you where I can, and next time you'll do better."

Sakura saw the seriousness in his eyes, her mouth still hung agape. She was shocked at what Naruto had said to her. She knew he was right and started to berate herself for thinking what she had thought before. "Your right," she wiped away the tears from her eyes. "Thank you Naruto-kun." She blushed when she heard the change in suffix at the blonde's name. When she felt that his hand still grasped hers she blushed even more as they pulled away. A lite blush was on Naruto's face.

"Anytime, Sakura-Chan," Naruto scratched the back of his head. "I can't take all the credit, some of that advice came from a new friend of mine." He then remembered something, "that's right, did you know that there was a train that goes from Boulder City to here?"

"Yeah, I found out when the other coordinators were talking about it." She stated feeling a bit ashamed that she didn't know about it earlier.

"Yeah, well my new friend, aside from buying me a ticket for the contest, gave me two passes for the train. We can use them at any time to get back to Boulder City. Now we don't have to cross the desert." Naruto grinned.

"That's great, I'm so glad we don't have too." She had a relieved look on her face.

"Okay, so any idea on where the next contest would be?" Naruto asked.

"It's in Mist City, I don't know when, but I do know that they have them there often. More so than Sand Dune Town have theirs." A thoughtful look passed across her face.

"That's great, that is where the next gym is wow that is lucky, huh?" Naruto smiled at the luck they were having. "Well I'm going to find Sasori; hopefully I can get a battle out of him soon. Then we can head for Mist City." Sakura nodded, Naruto soon left after that, to give the girl some privacy as well as to find Sasori.

_Later.._

Naruto made his way back stage, a part of him was surprised at the lack of security in the contest hall. Right now he was more focused on finding Sasori; he found a stage hand and decided to ask this person. "Excuse me, where can I find Sasori?"

The man turned around to face the blonde, "Sasori?" Naruto nodded, "Let's see, I think I saw him over by the water cooler, he might still be there. It's down the hall, you can't miss it really."

Naruto nodded thanks, and then he along with the golden Vulpix was off to find the gym leader. Following the man's simple instructions led him right to the water cooler. He saw Sasori there talking to some random person. He approached the man. "Excuse me, Sasori-san?" The red head turned to face the blonde.

"Hey, your that kid from yesterday right? The blonde with the golden Vulpix, are you a contestant?" Sasori queried.

"No, my friend was though, it was her first time so she didn't do as well as she wanted to." Sasori nodded at this.

"So what are you doing back here? Is this about a battle?" Sasori asked the blonde, hitting the nail on the head.

"Yeah, I wanted to challenge you to a battle, soon hopefully."

"Why the hurry?" Sasori asked, "Can't wait to fight the champion?"

"No, my friend wants to enter the contest in Mist City, and that's where a gym is. So I wanted to get a battle as soon as possible so we can make it in time for the contest." Naruto stated.

"Hmm, you should have gone to Mist City first. See they have a contest every day, small ones. Usually only the locals enter, that's a better place to have a first contest, its smaller crowds. Which one was your friend?" Sasori seemed to completely forget about the battle, which kinda ticked Naruto off.

"Her name's Sakura Haruno, she was the one with the Bulbasaur." Naruto answered regardless of how he felt.

"Ah, I remember her; she has potential, she herself stood out from the others. However, her performance was mediocre, I'm sure it was just due to nerves but a Sand Dune Town contest is not a good starting contest. See most of these performers have won at least two contests before this one. If she did complete her performance, she might not have made it through the second round." Sasori took a sip from a paper cup, "However, if she were to have done at least one small contest before this one, then she would have done a lot better than she did. So tell her to try coming back and trying again." With that Sasori started to walk off.

Naruto was in a stupor for a moment, and then he noticed the gym leader walking off. "Hey, what about my gym battle?" His answer was the man waving his hand lazily as he walked off. Naruto stood confused; Kurama was just as baffled as Naruto. He decided to make his way back to the stands back to his seat.

When Naruto got to his seat he was surprised to see Sakura there in the seat that was once Kudo's. He walked to his seat by the pink haired girl. "Hey Sakura-Chan, where did my friend go?"

"Oh, he waved me down when I was trying to find you, he told me that I could have his seat and finish watching the contest, since I didn't get past the first round. He said that it may help me to understand the second round for next time, he seems to think that I will get that far next time." Sakura had a sad smile on her face, almost as if she didn't believe the words of the stranger. "Oh, and he gave me this," she held up a small note pad, "it has a bunch of notes and key points to work on, hints and tips to get Jade ready for the next contest. I don't know who he was, but he was a nice man." Sakura smiled.

"Yeah, he was a really cool guy." Naruto sat and started to watch the contest, it was okay the second part of the contest was a sort of a talent show. It showcased the coordinators talent while the Pokémon did something that either complimented the talent or corresponded with the talent. It was okay, but Naruto couldn't really pay attention to it. Mostly because he wasn't waiting for Sakura to come on, he would have just left, but he wanted to stay there while Sakura watched. He saw that someone had left a newspaper near his seat, a bit random, but it would help his boredom.

He picked up the paper and began to read it starting with the front page. He saw that the picture on the front was a bit tragic; it showed a car that was completely totaled. The head line stated, 'Tragic hit and run takes life of two.' He reads on trying to figure out how something so tragic could have happened. While reading he found that it happened two weeks ago, the driver that had hit the car was drunk, he survived but wasn't at the scene. They found him later by tracing the plates of his vehicle; he would be going to court the day after tomorrow. It happened near Boulder City, so it must have been around the time that he got his first badge. He's surprised he didn't hear about it then, of course he was only focused on his own goals and getting his first badge. Really it wasn't until he met Jiraiya that he started to open his eyes to others.

The names of the people is what really got him, he didn't recognize the man's last name, but he did the woman's maiden name. '_Aomori?_' Naruto thought, '_Is she related to Aomori-san?_' Naruto read on, it didn't say anything at first. But he found that the two were newlyweds and that they both were coordinators. Then he found what he was looking for, the family they left behind, the boy was shock to find that Kudo was the girl's father. "_My daughter and son-in-law were supposed to accompany me, but last minute changes prevented that._" The words of the man came back to him, '_Why didn't he mention it before?_' A part of him stated that he didn't ask, which was true. The blonde may have been open to the mothers back in wave, but he was forced to. If he had been open to the man he may have found out that his daughter and son-in-law had died recently. But he was so focused on himself that he didn't think to.

'_I need to be more open to people, if I had known I could have said something, right?_' He didn't know the answer, but realization hit him, '_That kinda explains why he bought me a ticket and gave me those two train passes. Could it be that I reminded him of the ones he lost?_' Again he didn't know the answer; he might have if he had been more open with the man. '_I really gotta start opening up more, and talking to people._' He thought back to wave, and how good it felt to help those mothers out. '_I should probably also help people out more, it felt good helping those mothers out._' A small smile came to his face when he thought of all the rewards he got for helping those mothers. He then decided that he was going to be more open, and be more helpful to others whether they were friends or ones he just met.

"Sempai, the contest is over now." Sakura stated knocking the boy from his musings.

Naruto looked to the stage to see the winner getting a ribbon; he started to clap with everyone else. When the girl stepped down and walked off the stage, she almost tripped, but righted herself. This must have been her first big win in front of a large crowd. Naruto and Sakura were about to leave, just as others were. But Sasori stepping on to the stage and taking the microphone stopped the blonde.

"Can I have your attention please?" Sasori's voice boomed, "First off thanks to all those visiting from other cities and towns, and thanks to all that participated. Now I have a very special announcement, tomorrow at three o clock I will be having a battle at the gym, if you want you are all invited to the event. If you're wondering who the challenger is then he is here with us in the crowd." Sasori pointed to Naruto, in which a spotlight came upon the blonde and his golden Vulpix. "Now, forgive me for not asking sooner, but what is your name?"

Someone came up to Naruto and put a microphone to his mouth, "Uh, Namikaze Naruto?" Naruto didn't know how to answer. He heard a collective gasp from some of the audience members.

"Namikaze Naruto, the champion's son, well ladies and gentlemen you have to come out now. Come see the rising star as he faces off against me. Who will win?" Sasori asked, "And while you're at the gym be sure to secure yourself a ticket for my next production premiering in two weeks." Sasori said into the microphone, the crowd started to clap and cheer loudly at that.

'_Uh, do what now?_' Naruto couldn't believe his luck, he got a gym battle, but he might have to battle in front of a crowd as big as this one? He swallowed hard, but then he started to think, '_If, no when I face my father, I will have to battle in front of a crowd ten times bigger than this._' The Elena tournament was a big event, one that almost everyone who can, comes to it. That's why it is held in Capitol City, the biggest city in the Elena region. '_Well, I shouldn't worry, my Pokémon can handle anything._' With that He, Kurama, and Sakura made their leave.

"Are you nervous Naruto-sempai?" Sakura asked.

"Nope." Naruto answered simply, but inside his stomach was doing backflips, and not in the good way.

_The next day.._

Naruto made his to the gym to have his second gym battle, going over his strategy and trying to calm his nerves. '_You can do this Naruto; you trained with Jiraiya one of the three masters. You trained in the desert heat, you can do this._' He looked to his comrade, Kurama. The Vulpix was walking alongside him focused on the road ahead. '_Okay, so I'm going to start things off with Kurama. Verdant will be next, followed by Valor. I would use Puka, she needs a gym battle win, but since she just evolved I'm still getting her used to her new form._' He thought back to yesterday when he tried training Puka. The newly evolved Pikachu was still overwhelmed by her power increase. Plus when he had her working on her agility she was all over the place, she still wasn't used to her new form. Putting her in a gym battle as she is now would not be a smart move. Neptune may be ready, but even though he doesn't freeze anymore, he isn't the best strategist. Not like how Kurama or Verdant is, or even how Valor was the other day in the desert. He's afraid that if things get sticky that he may not think his way out, he still needs experience in other battles.

"I wish I could just have gone with Sakura-Chan, man why does this have to be in front of an audience?" Naruto complained to no one. Sakura went ahead of Naruto early so she could try getting a good seat for his battle. Thanks to Sasori announcing his battle with Naruto, the boy hasn't been able to walk around outside without being crowded by people asking about his dad. He knew that it was going to be a big turnout, mostly because of who his father was. "Well, on the bright side I can show them what _I _can do." Naruto stated with a fist pump, this excited him a little, enough to calm his nerves. "Yeah, not only will I get my second badge but I'll show everyone that I am Naruto Namikaze, Pokémon Trainer, future champion, and not just the champion's son." With that Naruto began to run towards the gym with Kurama running alongside him. He got to the gym in no time after that, he saw that the last of the crowd was making their way into the gym. Naruto walked up to the doors, to one of the ushers. "Uhm, I'm here for a gym battle, I'm-"

"Mr. Namikaze?" The man asked, Naruto nodded, "Great, this way." He led the boy to the other side of the building, at this point Kurama decided to hitch a ride on Naruto's shoulder. Naruto was led to a pair of double doors; the usher opened the doors and motioned for the boy to step inside. "Just head straight and take a right."

Naruto had a confused look on his face but he nodded. He went through the double doors then they were closed after his entrance. He could hardly see anything, there was very little light. As he walked through the hall trying to see where he was, he could hear a faint noise. It sounded like grouped together mumbling. When he took the right he could see a faint light get brighter as he walked towards it, the mumbling was getting louder as he did so. Soon he stepped out and was shrouded in light, he held up his arm to shield his eyes from the brightness. It came from a spot light; when his eyes adjusted he lowered his arm and took in his surroundings. The mumbling came from the large crowd that was in a stadium like arena. Looking around he could see that every seat was filled, and they were all cheering and clapping.

"_Ladies and gentlemen, the challenger Naruto Namikaze!_" Naruto heard a voice echoed. He looked up to see a large square like object with four flat screen monitors on each side. On the monitor it showed the blonde looking up with Kurama looking around at the crowd. "_And now, introducing the gym leader, Sasori!_" The crowd began to roar as Sasori came out the other side with a spot light on him. He waved to the crowd enjoying the attention. Naruto saw that the man was now wearing blue jeans with a green shirt tucked into them. A purple vest over the shirt, and shiny dress shoes; the man still had his black beret on his spikey red head.

Suddenly Naruto's personal space was being invaded as an usher began to fiddle with his shirt. "Hey what the hell?" Naruto was shocked when he heard his own voice echoed through the stadium.

"It's okay Naruto it's just a microphone, so the crowd can hear you." Came Sasori's voice from the stadium speakers.

"Oh," Naruto was told by one of the stage hands to slip the box that the microphone connected to down his shirt. It was so the wire wouldn't get in his way. Doing so the small box was slipped into his back pocket. "Uhm, hello?" At this the crowd cheered again. Naruto started to laugh nervously, a blush coming on his face when he heard his chuckle through the speakers.

"_Let's begin this battle, challenger, chose your first Pokémon._" The announcer stated over the speakers, Naruto didn't see anyone else on the floor so he assumed that the announcer was probably hidden away somewhere.

"Right," Naruto tried to ignore his voice as it came over the speakers. "Let's do this Kurama!" The golden Vulpix yipped as he leapt from the blonde's shoulders and on to the stadium floor. He crouched down ready for anything.

"Looks like you're ready." He grabbed a ball and threw it to the open arena. "Let's go Clash." Out of the ball came a large purple scorpion like creature. Its eyes were pointed shape with blue upper portions, two small, pointed protrusions between its eyes, and one on the back on its head. It also had protrusions on its jaws, two on the upper and three on the lower, with large, fang-like, white-colored features extending from its mouth. Its body had many segments that ended at the tail with two stingers. It had four segmented legs with pointed toes. The most distinguishing feature is its huge claws, which had a blue circular marking on the undersides, a similar marking being on the tail.

Naruto pulled out his poke-dex; he's never seen a Pokémon like that.

_Ding_

_Drapion, the Ogre Scorpion Pokémon. Its claws give off a deadly poison and they are powerful enough to turn an automobile into scrap iron._

"Whoa," Naruto stated which echoed through the stadium, he was starting to ignore it by now though. "He seems tough Kurama lookout for his claws okay?" The Vulpix nodded as he got ready.

"Let's begin with Act one, ready, and action!" Sasori stated, "Clash, hit him with **Bug Bite**!" The Drapion came charging in towards Kurama, catching him off guard the attack hit. Kurama cried out in pain when the large scorpion bit him.

Naruto saw that the Drapion was now eating something, and then the attacks effect came to mind. "No, he ate Kurama's Pecha Berry." Naruto stated worried, now if the Pokémon is poisoned he wouldn't be able to heal himself.

"With this strange turn of events, how will our young challenger react?" Sasori stated seeming to narrate the battle. Naruto stare in shock for a moment, but he shook it off.

"Come on Kurama it's only a minor setback, let's win this." Kurama nodded, and to everyone's shock, he started to run towards Clash his tails glowing for a second before all six turned to metal. The fox leapt up into the air and crashed its tails down on the purple Pokémon. He leapt back and waited for the dust to dissipate; while he was waiting he was shocked slightly to see a bit of smoke come at him until it appeared to be Drapion. He turned to run and dodge the Pokémon's attack, but somehow the Pokémon gained on him. It leapt up into the air then came down on the fire type, sinking his now purple glowing fangs into the fox, who cried out in pain. "Kurama!" Naruto shouted.

Kurama stood up when the Pokémon got off of him, with some effort. A purple haze was coming off the area where the Drapion had bitten him. When Kurama stood he could feel it stinging his flesh. "_Damn it, I'm poisoned now, and that bastard ate my Pecha Berry. Arceus this hurts._" He grunted out as he got his footing, he grounded his teeth as he tried to forget the pain he was in now, but it proved to be difficult.

"Come on Kurama, you can do it!" Naruto called, Kurama could also hear the chanting of the crowd calling for him to not give up. He smirked a bit; he pushed the pain to the back of his mind and glared at the Drapion.

"_Is that the best you got?_" Kurama stated with a smirk, one eye was tightly shut.

"_You're a cocky son of a bitch aren't you?_" Clash stated smirking at the Pokémon's actions. Kurama only did a mock shrug, but winced afterwards.

"Now, for a quick script change, Clash **Venoshock**." Sasori called for the Pokémon's next attack.

The Drapion shot purple ooze at Kurama, the fox tried to move but his poison spot caught him off guard and he winced instead of dodging. When he was hit with the liquid his eyes widen ten times their normal size in shock. He let out a harsh scream that echoed throughout the entire stadium. The pain he was feeling now was possibly the worst pain he has ever felt.

"Kurama!" Naruto shouted out in shock for his Pokémon.

When the liquid was gone and off of Kurama he was struggling to get up off the ground. He managed to stand but only for a second before he fell back to the ground. His vision was beginning to blur, he was having a hard time focusing on his surroundings. '_Maybe I can just take a quick nap._'

"Kurama! Don't give up, you can do it, I know you can! Kurama!" His eyes snapped open when he heard his trainer's cry.

'_No, I'll rest right after I defeat this bastard._' He thought as he grinded his teeth together, he stood up on shaky legs, but thanks to sheer will they started to steady. He focused solely on the Pokémon in front of him, his pain and his exhaustion was now in the back of his mind. He charged forward once again with glowing tails, "_Take this asshole._" Kurama slammed the six metal tails into the Pokémon's head knocking it to the ground; he landed in front of the scorpion creature. Not giving Clash a chance to get up, he started to gather fire into his mouth, and then he let loose a large stream of fire at point break range. The Drapion was engulfed in flames as it cried out in pain, not stopping there; he leapt back creating some distance between him and the other Pokémon. He started to charge forward again, this time he was engulfed in flames as he struck the poison type Pokémon hard sending him back while he was still on fire he struck the ground hard.

When the fire cleared Drapion was still smoking with multiple burn marks on his body. He didn't move only groaning as his eyes were shut tightly. Everyone waited for what seemed like hours but was only seconds, before they saw that the Pokémon was not moving. "_Clash is unable to battle the winner of this round is Kurama!_" The announcer called over the speakers, resulting in the crowd cheering loudly.

Kurama smirked before he fell forward, "Kurama!" Naruto shouted as he ran out for his Pokémon, suddenly the crowd grew silent as they watched the scene unfold. "Kurama, are you all right?" The Pokémon groaned a bit as an answer. Naruto started to dig around in his bag before he pulled out a spray bottle, he sprayed the purple spot on Kurama, then seconds later the purple color faded away, Naruto let out a breath he didn't know he was holding. He then put a blue berry inside Kurama's mouth; the Pokémon instinctively chewed the berry.

Kurama started to feel much better now since chewing the _Oran Berry_. Then he did something that shocked the blonde, he licked his cheek. This resulted in the crowd doing a simultaneous 'awe'. "You did great buddy, good job." Naruto carried Kurama back to his spot, then he laid him down by his feet so he could relax during the rest of the battle, "Just rest buddy okay?" Kurama nodded as he laid his head on his front paws. "Okay, let's go your up Verdant." Naruto threw a poke ball; pooping open it released his blue du rag wearing Treecko. The crowd began to cheer once again, Verdant ignored them, and instead, he chose to focus on the gym leader.

"Now it's time for Act two, let's see how this turns out." He pulled out a poke ball, and then threw it in the air. "Go! Henson." Out of the ball came another Pokémon that Naruto hasn't seen before. It looked like a Venus flytrap, with circular eyes and small pupils. Instead of legs this Pokémon had red and green vines attached to the end of its yellow and green-spotted stem like body; this gave the vines the appearance of tentacles. The leaves on its side appeared to be its arms, and appear to have three leafy fingers.

Once again Naruto pulled out his poke-dex.

_Ding_

_Carnivine, the Bug Catcher Pokémon. Carnivine latches onto tress in marshes and lures its prey with its sweet-smelling saliva._

"Jeez, glad I don't have a bug type." Naruto stated forgetting that everything he said the crowd heard. The crowd of fans started to laugh at the trainers joke. Naruto shook his head, "Okay Verdant, don't get caught off guard by the people, try to strike hard and fast." Naruto stated, the Treecko nodded.

Verdant cocked his fist back as it began to glow green, he ran towards the other grass type. He leapt up into the air then brought the fist down upon Henson's head. He struck the ground hard, Verdant flipped then landed in front of the Pokémon. The Carnivine started to get up with no effort, almost as if he never got hit. This shocked Verdant slightly, but his eyes widened even more when he saw that Henson's left leafy hand started to glow green as he pulled it back. Verdant never got hit with another **Grass Knot **before, so this being the first time; he had to say that it hurt like hell.

Sasori smirked, he knew calling out the attack was somewhat pointless but he had something to say to it though. "Naruto, you do know that that move is only strong if your Pokémon is heavier than you're opponents. Right?" Naruto grounded his teeth together.

"Come on Verdant, get up, you can win this." Naruto call for his Pokémon, the crowd supported the blonde and the Treecko with more cheering.

Verdant got up, dazed slightly by the attack, but he shook it off. He dashed off towards the Pokémon, avoiding multiple purple sludge's that got fired his way. He jumped up then did a flip in the air. He brought his large tail down and struck the Pokémon hard in the head, causing him to crash into the ground cracking it slightly from the force. Verdant then jumped back and landed in front of the Pokémon, a smirk in place on his features.

Henson soon got up though, causing the smirk to leave the Pokémon's features. He stood tall once again to face the other grass type, however, he was rubbing a sore spot on his head from where the attack had hit. "Henson, use **Sleep Powder**." Sasori called, causing Naruto's and Verdant's eyes to widen. Henson opened his mouth one hundred and eighty degrees, and then began to release a green powder that shot forth for Verdant. Verdant covered his mouth and tried not to breath in the powder, he even moved out of the way of the attack.

Verdant's eyes started to get heavy, but he fought it off, '_I won't fall asleep, not until this bastard goes down._' He focused on his opponent, '_I need to finish this, now. But how?_' His bleary eyes scanned the area trying to figure out if he could use anything to his advantage. Looking up he saw the large square like object above him. "_That's it._" He stated to himself. '_I never went that high before, but nothing ventured nothing gained._' With that thought he shocked the crowd and the Pokémon in front of him by running towards his opponent. He leapt up once again, using the Pokémon's confusion to his advantage. He did a flip and struck the Pokémon with its tail once again, this time; however, he used his tail as a spring board to propel himself up with as much force as he could muster. This caused the Pokémon under him to grunt with pain, due to him hitting the sore spot. The leap was enough for him to fly towards the collection of monitors, before he hit he turned to land on device.

He then pumped his legs to launch himself off of the monitors and towards the ground where the Carnivine laid. He cocked his fist back as green energy started to glow from his fist. When he was only a few feet from the Pokémon he threw his fist forward. The force of the attack caused the ground to shake when it hit the Pokémon. Carnivine was imbedded into the ground from the attack. '_Whoa, it used the force of gravity from its fall to increase its **Grass Knot's **power._' Sasori thought in shock. Carnivine struggled to remove his head from the ground, with a pop, he succeeded. The success was short lived, for he soon fell forward.

"_Good, he's out._" Verdant stated before he fell back letting the effect his opponents last attack consume him. He started to snore as he lay on the ground.

"_Henson is unable to battle, even though Verdant is asleep he isn't out, therefore Verdant wins this round._" The announcer called causing the audience to cheer for the Pokémon's win.

"Good job, Verdant return." Naruto held out his poke ball letting a red beam hit Verdant, the Pokémon turned to red light as he went back into his small home.

"That was an amazing move you pulled their kid, your Pokémon pulling something like that on its own, well that says something about you." Sasori commented.

"Thanks, I had some help training him and my other Pokémon from Master Jiraiya." Naruto stated.

"Well that explains it then, good work." He pulled out another ball, "Are you ready for act three?"

"Yeah," Naruto took out another ball and threw it, "let's do this Valor." With a pop, Naruto's Riolu came out ready for a good fight.

"Let's steal the show, Ozker." Sasori threw a ball into the air, before it hit the ground it popped open to reveal yet another Pokémon that Naruto did not know of. This Pokémon was cactus-like, with large ear-like extensions. The extensions featured dark green spiky arrangements at the base, yellow spikes further up, and flowers, with pink petals and yellow centers, at the top. It had a yellow spike on its head, yellow eyes and a spiky-looking mouth. Other dark green spiky arrangements adorn its neck, the wrists of its yellow-fingered arms, and base. Its base had three foot or root-like stubs. Naruto had to pull out his poke-dex for the third time that day.

_Ding!_

_Maractus, the Cactus Pokémon. When Maractus dance in rhythm, they sound like maracas shaking. They make their homes in dry desert-like areas._

"Okay Valor, let's win this battle." Naruto declared, the crowd cheered when they heard Naruto's proclamation. Valor stood ready, he nodded at his trainers words and stared at the Pokémon in front of him.

"_My, my you're a cutie aren't you?_" The cactus Pokémon stared lusciously at Valor, making him a bit uncomfortable at the sound of the female voice. "_Too bad we have to battle, wish we could wrestle around in my ball, if you catch my meaning._" The Pokémon's feral grin grew as she stared at Valor.

Valor did not know what to think of the flirtatious Pokémon, he was ready for taunting and insults. He was completely caught off guard, which is why he was easily struck by a glowing arm of the cactus Pokémon. '_Damn it Valor! She is just messing with you; you could have easily dodged that attack. Focus!_' He screamed in his mind as he stood glaring at the laughing Pokémon in front of him.

"_Awe, I'm sorry did I forget to tell you I was going to attack? How silly of me._" She made a mock pose which only caused Valor to grow angrier. So with paws glowing blue he ran towards the cactus Pokémon trying in vain to strike her. She seemed to dance around his strikes; an annoying sound of beans shaking in a can was being made with every shake.

"Now use **Poison Jab**." Sasori called out, as his Pokémon continued to dance around Valor's attacks. Her arm glowed purple as she pulled it back, when Valor wasn't expecting it she jabbed her arm into his chest. He was sent back to hit the ground a few feet in front of Ozker.

'_Damn it, that hurt,_' when he went to move his right arm he felt a stinging sensation in his chest area. '_Shit, that really hurts._' He grabbed the purple glowing area on his chest in pain. It was enough to send him to his knees; he was breathing hard trying to control his rapid breath. Just when he was about to stand, the Maractus came charging in with another glowing arm, it felt as though he was being hit with pins. It was enough to send up in the air, only for gravity to take hold and bring him back down.

"Valor!" Naruto yelled out when he saw his Pokémon hit the ground. "Valor, come on get up you can do it!" Naruto shouted to give his Pokémon support needed to get up and continue the fight.

The support seemed to work, for Valor soon stood, shakily. When he was fully up, he clutched the purple spot on his chest. '_This poison area is a real nuisance._' He grounded his teeth, forcing himself to keep his eyes on the enemy Pokémon. She never moved, only stood there shaking from side to side, making that annoying sound. '_I can hardly move with this poison area stinging. If only there was a way to ignore it._' Then he was struck with an idea, not giving it much thought as to whether it would work or not, he instead went ahead. His left paw glowed blue as he brought it back, then, shocking everyone, he struck the purple area hard. "_Ahh!_" He cried out in pain, but it soon subsided, with it the stinging was now dull enough for him to ignore it.

Using the shock to his advantage Valor took Ozker by surprise when he showed up in front of her. He strikes hard with his foot sending her flying back. He then appeared behind her and struck up with his foot, sending her into the air. Then jumping so he could appear above her he struck her several times in the gut with blue glowing paws. He kept striking until she hit the ground then jumped back away from her, putting some distance between them.

"Let's finish this Valor, **Aura Sphere**." The name of the attack shocked all, Sasori thought it to be some kind of trick, to stall in order to attack with something different. So instead of countering he awaited his Pokémon to stand, so she could launch another onslaught of attacks.

Valor threw his arms behind him, clenching his teeth at the slight pain in his chest, but he ignored it. He instead focused on his aura, forcing it into his paws to where it became dense. Shocking everyone into silence, a blue ball started to appear between his paws. He started a slow walk towards the down Pokémon that was struggling to get up, the ball increasing in size a bit. The walk turned to a jog as he saw that the Maractus was almost up, the ball now half his size. The jog turned to a run when he saw his opponent stand up, the ball now the same size as himself. "_Take this you bitch! **Aura Sphere**!_" He thrust his paws forward, thrusting the ball of aura into the shocked Pokémon. The ball struck hard, and with a loud battle cry, Valor shot the ball from his paws sending it and the balls captive straight for the wall opposite of the two Pokémon. With a loud crash the two met the wall, the ball stayed visible for a second before it exploded, causing a large crater to form in the wall, along with stirring up some dust.

Valor still had his arms outstretched, breathing hard, but he suddenly grabbed his hurting chest and fell to a knee. With one eye still opened he stared at the area where his opponent was now, the lack of movement being a good sign. The dust started to clear and with it gone everyone bearing witness could now see the Maractus imbedded into the wall, her eyes seemed to be rolled up into her head. She groaned as she slowly started to fall from the wall to meet the ground with a lite thud. Everyone stared in shock, even the announcer was at a loss for words.

But it was only for a moment, for the man behind the voice soon righted himself, "_Ozker is unable to battle, the winner of this round is Valor. Ladies and gentlemen the winner of the gym battle is Naruto Namikaze from Leaf Town!_" The man shouted in both shock and excitement, the crowd stood and cheered loudly at the result of the battle.

Valor smirked, but fell to the ground after letting out a cry of pain, "Valor!" Naruto ran out to his Pokémon to check up on him. He was unconscious, but Naruto got to work, he pulled out a spray bottle and sprayed the purple area, this caused the area to clear up. But there was still a bruise there from where Valor had struck himself. Naruto took out another spray bottle and sprayed the area; this caused Valor to flinch and whine a little at the stinging spray. "I know it hurts, but it will help the bruising, at least until we get you back to the Pokémon Center." Naruto patted the Pokémon on the head, "but, good job out there Valor I'm really proud of you." This caused Valor to smile; Naruto pulled out a ball and held it up. "Great work, now rest buddy." Valor returned to his ball with no protests. When Naruto stood he was met by Sasori, Naruto nodded to the man, "Is you're Pokémon all right?" Sasori nodded.

"Yeah, she'll be fine with some rest; it's her pride I'm more worried about." Sasori laughed at the joke, "But you did win, and it was a great battle, Deidara did say that you'd put up a great fight."

Naruto was shock to hear the name, "Wait, you know Deidara?"

"Yes, when we were younger we traveled together; we were quite the pair of double battlers." Sasori seemed to be thinking of something, for he had a nostalgic look on his face. "But anyway, here is your badge, proof that you had beaten the Sand Dune Town gym leader, the Puppet Badge."

The badge Naruto received from the leader was oval shaped, with a third of the bottom part being smaller. The part seemed to be some sort of mouth, two small dots that looked like a nose. Three dots on the upper part of the oval, two side by side with one on top, the top of the badge had what looked like bluish green spikey hair. Naruto held it up, shouting, "Yes! I got, the Puppet Badge!" Kurama jumped up and yipped happily for his trainer. The crowd also cheered for the blonde as he celebrated his win.

**(A/N: Soooo Sorry for the long wait guys. I have been going through a lot of stuff in my life and it is hard getting the motivation to write. Before I get to the thanks and stuff. You should know that one of the reasons I am having trouble writing is that my dad died last year due to liver cancer. I'm just now being open about it, and it's almost as if it's just now hitting me. So that is one of the reasons why it's been hard to write. Another is that my love life is getting really complicated and it's been eating up my time. I'm trying to go back to school, trying to get a job, it's just so hard. Anyway, on to the thanks, a great big thank you to blue-hart, he was the one to give me an idea for two of Sasori's Pokémon. He also is doing a fan art for this fic, I hope to put it up as a cover for the story. The idea's of the nicknames of Sasori's Pokémon are last names of puppeteers, I think all of them worked on Sesame Street, but hey they are Puppeteers. So yeah, Henson as in Jim Henson, you should know who that is. Clash as in Kevin Clash, he's the voice of Elmo. Ozker, Eren Ozker she did the Muppet Show way back when. So I thought that those were pretty awesome names. Next chapter will probably take as long as this chapter did to write, but I doubt it will be as long as this chapter was. I am not doing a beta for any of my stories anymore, a great big sorry to Clintosaurus, by the way if you have time or if you need a beta yourself, check out his profile. Sorry no story preview for the next chapter, still working on the plot and all, check back though because I might put one in. Anyone else looking forward to the new Pokémon X and Y game? Fennekin looks like a baby Kurama. Anyway thank you all for the kind reviews and messages, feel free to keep them coming they do help. Have an awesome day guys, ttfn ta ta for now.)**


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